LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Shelf jum 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



"EUREKA;" 



OR, 



TRe Golden Door Jlj&r, 



Mysteries of the World Mysteriously Revealed. 



Now Published for the First Time. 



NEW AND ORIGINAL THEORIES OF THE CREATION OF THE WORLD- 
ITS AGE— ATMOSPHERE — SHAPE — LAW OF GRAVITATION — 
MOVEMENT ON ITS AXIS, ETC. ALSO THE CAUSE 
AND USES OF VOLCANIC ERUPTION— HOW 
MOUNTAINS ARE* MADE — WHAT ARE 
COMETS AND METEORS, ETC. 






By ASA T. GREEN V 

MAR 29 1883 ' 

CINCINNATI, O.: ^^wash^ C 

A. G. Collins, Editor and Publisher, 
1883. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the office 
of the Librarian, by 
Asa T. Green and A. G. Collins, 
in the year 1883. 



ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 



PREFACE. 



{HERE has been a long felt want in private 
libraries, and in the literary world gener- 
ally, for a work that would assist the general 
reader who has been deprived of a course of 
study of Astronomy and Geology, in forming 
some opinion of the formation, movements and 
surroundings of our world, and, as was said by 
one, "that writer does the most who gives the 
readers the most knowledge, and takes from him 
the least time." 

And as the volume of a book does not consist 
in its size, but in the quality of its contents, we 
shall be as brief as an intelligent presentation of 
Mr. Green's theories will permit, with a brief 
statement of the teachings of Astromony and 
Geology, in order that the reader, uneducated 
in those sciences, may be enabled the more rea- 
dily to understand the points in his theory, and 



4 EUREKA. 

believing that the person who ignores these 
sciences entirely, loses half the beauties of life ; 
because, to know how good God is, we must 
study his works of creation, whereby we may 
draw nearer to him. As an evidence of the in- 
fluence such study will have upon us, take an 
instance. We can stand for hours gazing on the 
landscape painting of some celebrated painter, 
with whom we have no personal aquaintance. 
Yet when we look upon the same scenes in 
nature it fails to secure from us a second look. 
Why is it so ? except that in the painting we 
admire the power of the artist to catch the idea 
of the creator. So in life, the more we study 
creation, the nearer we come to possessing the 
divine idea, and hence the more we enjoy life. 
Milton sublimely represents the body of Truth 
hewn in pieces, and her limbs scattered over 
distant regions, so that her friend and disciples 
have to go wandering all over the world in quest 
of them. There is surely something very won- 
derful in the fact, that, in uniting the links of 
the chain of creation into an unbroken whole, 



EUREKA. O 

we have in like manner to seek for them all 
along the scale of Geology. Some we discover 
among the tribes first annihilated, some among 
the tribes that perished at a later peri9d, some 
among the existences of the passing time. We 
find the present incomplete without the past, 
the recent without the extinct. 

There are marvellous analogies which per- 
vade the schemes of Providence, and unite, as 
it were, its lower with its higher parts. The 
perfection of the works of the Deity is a per- 
fection entire in its components ; and yet these 
are not contemporaneous, but successive ; it is 
a perfection which includes the dead as well as 
the living, and bears relation, in its complete- 
ness, not to time, but to eternity. 

Man is fearfully and wonderfully made, and 
in the Creator's divine economy, how careful has 
he been to anticipate man's every want, causing 
the earth to yield her increase, giving an abund- 
ant supply of food to sustain the natural man, 
and all nature teeming with the myriad har- 
monious voices to cheer and educate the spir- 



6 EUREKA*. 

itual man. The rich man may have his walls 
decorated with works of art, but the poor man 
has the original of them, for the book of nature 
is open to all who will look and read, be he rich 
or poor, as, leaf by leaf, the ever-varying, ever- 
changing seasons roll round in their successive 
paths, — yet to how many the book is a sealed 
book — they see nothing in nature's surrounding 
beauty but clay, stone, logs, dry grass, etc., 
and they only look upon these for the purpose 
of fixing a value on and their conversion into 
money ! 

The ideas of Mr. Green are such as carried 
conviction with them to the minds of all who 
have heard his lectures. I have endeavored to 
give his theory in his own language as far as 
possible. His propositions are clearly and forci- 
bly stated. 

He is an uneducated man, but his reasoning 
powers seems to belong to one of those mys- 
terious freaks of nature akin to inspiration, which 
sometimes enables babes and sucklings to furnish 
the key to unexplored fields of knowledge, 



EUREKA. 7 

which the learned and educated have life long 
sought yet died with their labors unrewarded. 

In the author's biographical sketch he tells 
how, when and where, his eyes were first 
opened, and he first realized the possession of 
this knowledge ; and his personal appearance, 
owing to his physical condition, has been a 
constant drawback to him, while striving to 
enter to unladen his over-burdened brain, he is 
driven from the doors of academies and colleges, 
or, if perchance, he obtained an entrance, he is 
violently ejected, and in some instances brutally 
assaulted, without being given even time to 
explain that his appearance was owing to his 
physical weakness and not to intoxicating 
liquors. All those who have given him audi- 
ence, gave testimonials of the superior value of 
his theories in the scientific world, equal to 
those of the Corinthians in regard to Paul when 
they said : 

"For his letters, say they, are weighty 
and powerful, but his bodily presence is weak, 
and his speech contemptible." 



8 EUREKA. 

Mr. Green, in the possession of his knowledge, 
seems to feel as did Paul when he said : 

"Necessity is laid upon me ; yea, woe is 
unto me, if I preach not the Gospel l" 

It certainly requires of him a vast amount of 
moral courage, uneducated as he is, to pro- 
claim theories which run counter to those 
which have been accepted and acted on by the 
world as the true ones for so long time. For, 
says Dr. Holland : 

"The men are comparatively few who are will- 
ing to take the responsibility of the full assertion 
of their personality ; who will stand or fall by 
their convictions, sentiments and opinions; 
who will insist on being themselves, even 
when that is equivalent to being called singu- 
lar. How many there are who go dodging 
through life, shuning a collision here for the 
sake of peace, sacrificing a sentiment there 
rather than be guilty of singularity." 

And this too, when Manhood forbids such 
conduct. Such a life will dwarf the thinking 
powers of all who indulge in it, and yet by far 



EUREKA. 9 

the largest per cent of all the human family are 
found guilty, and consequently the per cent is 
very small who think for themselves. But the 
author comes with that confidence which only 
an honest sincere person can who has a mission 
to perform, and empties his storehouse of 
knowledge into the lap of science, backing his 
theories with logical and conclusive proofs of 
the same. The impression made by his theories 
upon thinking minds, is witnessed by some of 
the testimonials herein published. If, in sending 
this little waif adrift on the charitable, literary 
and scientific world we shall succeed in awaking 
an interest in the beauties and grand lessons 
taught in nature, then indeed will our mission 
have accomplished its end, and we be paid for 
our efforts. A. G. C. 



THE AUTHOR'S LIFE. 

BY HIMSELF. 

My name is Asa Thomas Green. I was born 
four and one half miles east of the town of Troy, 
Miami County, Ohio, on the now Troy and 
Springfield Pike, but then a dirt road. My 
father, Stephen D. Green, and mother, Hannah 
F. Green, were farm renters, and lived in an old 
log house when I was born, namely on the 
eleventh day of September, A. D. 1846. My 
parents were poor and obtained their living by 
working the farm, and my father at times buy- 
ing and dealing^in stock hogs. There were five 
children in the family, I being the eldest, 
there being three boys and one girl younger. 
My mother died August 23, A. D. 1882, at the 
age of fifty-eight years, eleven months and thirty 
days, with typhoid fever. 

The only school that I could attend was three- 
quarters of a mile from my father's house, and 



EUREKA. 11 

was located in the woods with no road leading 
to it, there being no way to reach it but by 
going across farms. The average school year 
was seven months. I commenced attending the 
school when I was eight years of age, and con- 
tinued to attend on an average of three or four 
months in each year till I was twenty-one years 
of age. I studied some in Arithmetic, always 
had a love for Grammar and Geography. Until 
I was thirteen years old I learned very slow, it 
taking me two years to learn my "A. B. Cs." 
I was very small and weak, having no disease, 
but being perfectly healthy. After I was 
thirteen, when education seemed to be most 
applicable to me, I was compelled to stay at 
home, more or less, to work on the farm. Having 
but little education then, I never gained much 
from that time. About this time, while at my 
uncles assisting in threshing, I received a fall 
which injured my spine, after which my memory 
began to increase till I was thirty years old. 
I first discovered my reasoning powers after my 
school days and injury, in a debating club which 



12 EUREKA. 

met of evenings in the school house. My first 
speech consisted of just three words, in a few 
weeks after I tried again and spoke five minutes, 
in my third speech I occupied fifteen minutes, 
the time allotted in debate to each speaker, 
and some weeks after my first peech, in my 
fourth attempt, my speech was so intensely in- 
teresting that I was given the whole evening. 
While at school I was constantly tormented by 
the pupils and others, as I was a peevish child 
and they delighted in teasing me. My father 
gave to my brothers and sisters a good educa- 
tion at college. I was considered of no account 
but to stay at home and work. I had an in- 
genious mind and invented some sixteen kinds 
of machinery, and after struggling for many days 
to obtain a partner to secure me patents, which 
I failed to secure, and becoming discouraged I 
was induced by one of our neighbors to turn 
my attention to lecturing and it was at this time I 
was attending the debating society. When I was 
about twenty-seven years old I asked God to 
bless me with wonderful knowledge, believing 



EUREKA. 13 

that he would, arid which I hope he has done. 
At that time we would make sugar in the 
spring of the year. The first knowledge which 
I got was while sitting on a log resting while 
carrying sugar water in two buckets to the 
camp. When I received it I arose from the log 
and delivered a speech of that knowledge to 
the trees, knowing that if they didn't like it they 
would not say anything about it. I practiced 
speaking in the woods by myself, telling in 
speech to the trees what came to me as it come, 
that being my only safety valve. The second 
revelation of this wonderful knowledge was in 
dreams two years ago while in Oil City, Titus- 
ville, Emington and Kittaning in Pennsylvania. 
I had and still have dreams of this wonderful 
knowledge, which you will find in my book, 
with the knowledge previously obtained. While 
in Kittaning I dreamed I saw an angel, and it 
had on it a large belt, which had written on it in 
capital letters the word ''Truth." This seemed 
to impress upon my mind, that what I had 
dreamed was the truth. As the light was burn- 



14 EUREKA. 

ing brightly, I arose in my bed, and looked with 
my eyes wide open ; then it vanished away. 

I have a great love for children, and have 
been a school visitor for seven years. I have 
visited up to the present date, two thousand 
and eighty-two different country schools, and 
have travelled to do so thirty-two hundred 
miles on foot. By rail I have travelled twenty- 
two thousand three hundred and five miles, 
making in all twenty-five thousand five hundred 
and five miles in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, 
Indiana and Michigan. I have been arrested 
and locked in station houses many times, both 
day and night, because from my appearance I 
was taken for a drunken man, although I never 
touch intoxicating liquors, or even coffee or tea, 
neither do I use tobacco in any form. So you 
see from my history to this date, that my life 
has been a constant struggle. The greatest ob- 
stacle in my way is my personal appearance. It 
prevents my obtaining opportunities to make 
known my knowledge. I have called at acade- 
mies and schools and have been repulsed by 



EUREKA. 15 

the sexton of the house or the principle. I 
have been driven from the buildings and 
grounds by violence. In one female college I 
was thrown down stairs by the president, and 
after getting to the front door knocked down 
and kicked in a brutal manner. This, too, by a 
man claiming to be a Christian minister, with- 
out giving me time to show my testimonials, a 
large portfolio of which I always carried. I 
have called at the dwellings of professors of 
colleges and have been refused admittance by 
domestics because they believed me to be a 
drunken tramp. Now as I have found a friend 
to assist me in giving my knowledge to the 
world in book form, I ask you to buy it and 
read it, and thus secure knowledge not in the 
books. Yours Truly, 

Asa Thomas Green. 



INTRODUCTION. 

How little man knows of the world in which 
he lives ! and yet it should not be so : for he 
who loves his God cannot help but love his works. 

The world is full of wonders, if we will only- 
study them. The work of the Great Spirit of 
Nature is as deep and unapprochable in the 
lowest as in the noblest objects, the Divine 
mind is as visible in its full energy of operation 
on every lowly bank and mouldering stone, as 
in the lifting of the pillars of heaven, and sett- 
ling the foundations of the earth ; and to the 
rightly-perceiving mind, there is the same in- 
finity, the same majesty, the same power, the 
same unity, and the same perfection, manifest 
in the casting of the clay as in the scattering of 
the cloud, in the molderingof the dust as in the 
kindling of the day star. And when we look 
upon the grand panorama nature spreads be- 



EUREKA. 17 

fore us, we do not wonder at the Psalmist's en- 
thusiastic declaration, when he says, "When I 
consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, 
the moon and the stars which thou hast or- 
dained : What is man, that thou art mindful 
of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest 
him?" 

And again how insignificant does poor, vain, 
conceited man become, when compared with 
the works of creation, as was done by God as 
recited in the thirty-eighth chapter of Job, when 
God spoke to him out of the whirlwind and 
commanded him to "Gird up" his "loins like a 
man" and answer. "Where wast thou when I 
laid the foundation of the earth? Who hath 
laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest ? Or 
who hath stretched the line upon it? Where- 
upon are the foundations thereof fastened? Or 
who laid the foundations thereof: When the 
morning stars sang together and all the sons of 
God shouted for joy," etc. 

How tender and sympathizing with natural 
things as though they had souls, does Christ 



18 EUREKA. 

speak of the lilies. "They toil not, neither do 
they spin," or "The sea saw that, and fled. 
Jordan was driven back. The mountains 
skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs." 
The whole book of Job presents the beauties 
of creation and its poetic power over the human 
heart. The country was arable, "The oxen 
were ploughing and the asses were feeding be 
side them." It was mountainous, "My breth- 
ren have dealt as deceitfully as a brook, and as 
the stream of brooks they pass away : which 
are blackish by reason of the ice and wherein 
the snow is hid: what time they wax warm 
they vanish: when it is hot they are consumed 
out of their place." Again. "If I wash 
myself with snow water and make my hands 
never so clean. Draught and heat consume 
the snow waters." It was a wooded and 
rocky country: "His branch shooteth forth in 
his garden ; his roots are wrapped about the 
heap and seeth the place of stones." "Thou 
shalt be in league with the stones of the field." 
Surely the mountain falling cometh to naught 



EUREKA. 19 

and the rock is removed out of its place/' 
The waters wear the stones : Thou washest 
away the things that grow out of the dust of 
the earth." ."He removeth the mountains 
and they know not : he overturneth them in 
anger/' "He putteth forth his hand upon the 
rock : he overturneth the mountains by the 
roots: he cutteth out rivers among the rocks." 
The hand of nature had been as lavish with his 
beauties in that country as in ours. Christ in 
performing his high mission on earth, spends 
nearly his whole life in the fields, on the moun- 
tains, and in the village of Bethpage, walking 
in the morning and evening through the Mount 
of Olives, to and from his work of teaching in 
the temple. 

Did you ever stop for an hour in your mad 
hurry through life and contemplate the beauties 
of the landscape surrounding you ? If not you 
have lost one of the greatest pleasures of life. 
Look on the following picture of a landscape 
drawn by Ruskin, and then answer me if such 
look has not awakened within your bosom high 



20 EUREKA. 

and holy thonghts, as your soul was refreshed 
with a pure and sweet inspiration from nature 
and nature's God? He says: "Let the reader 
imagine, first, the appearance of the most va- 
ried plain of some richly cultivated country ; 
let him imagine it dark with graceful woods, 
and soft with the deepest pastures, let him fill 
the space of it to the utmost horizon, with in- 
numerable and changeful incidents of scenery 
and life : leading pleasant streamlets through 
its meadows; strewing clusters of cottages be- 
side their banks, traceing sweet foot-paths 
through its avenues, and animating its fields 
with happy flocks, and slow wandering spots 
of cattle ; and when he has wearied Jiimself 
with endless imagining, and left no space with- 
out some lovliness of its own, let him conceive 
all this great plain, with its infinite treasures 
of natural beauty and happy human life, gath- 
ered up in God's hand from one end of the 
horizon to the other, like a woven garment, 
and shaken into deep falling folds, as the robes 
droop from a king's shoulders ; all its bright 



EUREKA. 21 

rivers leaping in cataracts along the hollows 
of its fall, and all its forests rearing themselves 
aslant against its slopes, as a rider rears him- 
self back when his horse plunges : and all its 
villages nestling themselves into the new wind- 
ings of its 'glens; and all its pastures thrown 
into steep waves of greensward, dashed with 
dew along the :, edges of their folds, and sweep- 
ing down in endless slopes, with a cloud here 
and there lying quietly, half on the grass, half 
in the air, and he will have as yet, in all this 
lifted world, only the foundation of one of the 
great Alps." 

Though nature is constantly beautiful, she 
does not exhibit her highest powers of beauty 
constantly. Her finest touches are things 
which must be watched for ; her most perfect 
passages of beauty are the most effervescent. 
She is constantly doing something beautiful for 
us, but it is something which she has not done 
before and will not do again. Some exhibition 
of her general powers in particular circum- 
stances, which, if we do not catch at the instant 



22 EUREKA. 

it is passing, will not be repeated for us. There 
is not a moment of a day of our lives, when 
nature is not producing scene after scene, pic- 
ture after picture, glory after glory, and work- 
ing still upon such exquisite and constant prin- 
ciples of the most perfect beauty, that it is 
quite certain that it is all done for us, and in- 
tended for our perpetual pleasure. And every 
man wherever placed, however far from other 
sources of interest or of beauty, has this doing 
for him constantly. The noblest scenes of 
earth can be seen and known but by few : it is 
not intended that man should live always in the 
midst of them; he injures them by his presence, 
he ceases to feel them if he be always with 
them : but the sky is for all : bright as it is, it is 
not "too bright, nor good, for human nature's 
daily food :" it is fitted in all its functions for 
the perpetual comfort and exalting of the heart, 
for soothing it, and purifying it from its dross 
and dust. Almost human in its passions, al- 
most spiritual in its tenderness, almost divine 
in its infinity, its appeal to what is immortal in 



EUREKA* 23 

us, is as distinct as its ministry of chastisement 
or of blessing to what is mortal or essential. 
And yet we never attend to it, we never make 
it a subject of thought, but as it has to do with 
our animal sensations. If we turn to. the sky 
in our longing desire for thought, it is to speak 
of it as, "it is going to rain/' or "windy," or 
"dry," or "hot." But who sees the dance of 
the dead clouds as the sunlight leaves them at 
night ? Or who of all my readers would have 
been so imbued with the scene as was Words- 
worth in his decription of the clouds in "The 
Excursion ?" He says : 

"But rays of light 
Now suddenly diverging from the orb, 
Returned behind the mountain tops, or veiled 
By the dense air, shot upward to thejcrown 
Of the blue firmament — aloft — and wide : 
* And multitudes of little floating clouds, 
Ere we, who saw, of change were conscious, 

pierced 
Through their etherial texture, had become 
Vivid as fire. Clouds seperately poised, 
Innumerable multitude of forms 
Scattered through half the circle of the sky : 
And giving back, and shedding each on each, 
With prodigaL communion, the bright hues 



24 EUREKA. 

Which from the unapparent fount of glory 
They had imbibed, and ceased not to receive. 
That which the heavens displayed, the liquid 

deep 
Repeated, but with unity sublime." 

Or as Shelly saw their slow movement — 

Underneath the young gray dawn 
A multitude of dense, white fleecy clouds 
Were wandering in thick flocks along the 

mountains, 
Shephe7'ded by the slow unwilling winds ." 

It is said that if you watch the sunset when 
there are a number of small clouds in the sky 
you will see, especially near the zenith, that the 
sky does not remain of the same color for two 
inches together: one cloud has a dark side of 
cold blue, and a fringe of miiky white, another 
above it, has a dark side of purple and an edge 
of red ? : another, nearer the sun, has an under 
side of orange and an edge of gold : these you 
will find mingled with, and passing into the 
blue of the sky, which in places you will not be 
able to distinguish from the <:ool grey of 
the darker clouds, and which will be itself 
full of gradation, now pure and deep, now faint 
and feeble : and all this done, not in large 



EUREKA. 25 

pieces, nor on a large scale, but over and over 
again in every square yard, so there is no single 
part, nor portion of the whole sky which has not 
in itself variety of color enough for a separate 
picture, and yet no single part which is like an- 
other, or which has not some peculiar source of 
beauty, and some peculiar arrangement of color 
of its own. Such is the exquisite composition, 
that you may take any single fragment of any 
cloud in the sky, and you will find it put to- 
gether, as if there had been a year's thought 
over the plan of it, arranged with the most 
studied inequality — with the most delicate sym- 
metry — with the most elaborate contrast, a pic- 
ture in itself, every piece of cloud in the heaven, 
perfect, yet none in the least like another. 

Look upon another picture of the poet 
painter: Stand upon the peak of some isolated 
mountain at day-break, when the night mists 
first rise from off the plains, and watch their 
white and lake-like fields, as they float in level 
bays and winding gulfs, about the islanded sum- 
mits of the lower hills, untouched, yet by more 



26 EUREKA. 

than dawn, colder and more quiet than a wind- 
less sea under the moon of midnight. 

Watch when the first sunbeam is sent upon 
the silver channels, how the foam of their un- 
dulating surface parts and passes away ; and 
down under their depths, the glittering city and 
green pastures lie like Atlantis, between the 
white paths of winding rivers ; the flakes of 
light falling every moment faster, and broader 
among the starry spires, as the wreathed surges 
break and vanish above them, and the confused 
crests and ridges of the dark hills shorten their 
gray shadows upon the plain. Wait a little 
longer, and you shall see those scattered mists 
rallying in the ravines, and floating up towards 
you, along the winding valleys, till they couch 
in quiet masses, irredescent with morning light, 
upon the broad breasts of the higher hills, whose 
leagues of massy undulation will rfielt back into 
that robe of material light, until they fade away, 
lost in its lustre, to appear again above, in the 
serene heaven, like a wild, bright, impossible 
dream, foundationlessand inaccessible, their very 



EUREKA. 27 

bases vanishing in the unsubstantial and mocking 
blue of the deep lake below; wait yet a little 
longer, and you shall see those mists gather 
themselves into white towers and stand like 
fortresses along the promontories, massy and 
motionless, only piling with every instant higher 
and higher into the sky, and casting longer 
shadows athwart the rocks ; and out of the pale 
blue of the horizon you will see forming and 
advancing a troop of narrow, dark, pointed 
vapors, which will cover the sky, inch by inch, 
with their gray network, and take the light off 
the landscape with an eclipse, which will stop 
the singing of the birds and the motion of the 
leaves together; and then you will see horizon- 
tal bars of black shadow forming under them, 
and lurid wreaths create themselves, you know 
not how, along the shoulders of the hills ; you 
never see them form, but when you look back 
to a place which was clear an instant ago, there 
is a cloud on it, hanging by the precipices, as a 
hawk over its prey ; and then you will hear the 
sudden rush of the awakened wind, and you 



28 EUREKA. 

will see those watch-towers of vapor swept 
away from their foundations, and waving cur- 
tains of opaque rain let down to the valleys, 
swinging from the burdened clouds in black, 
bending fringes, or pacing in pale columns 
along the lake level, grazing its surface into 
foam as they go. And then, as the sun sinks, 
you shall see the storm drift for an instant from 
off the hills, leaving their broad sides smoking, 
and loaded yet with snow-white, torn, steam-like 
rags of capricious vapor, now gone, now gath- 
ered again ; while the smoldering sun, seeming 
not far away, but burning like a red hot ball 
beside you, and as if you could reach it, plunges 
through rushing wind and rolling cloud with 
headlong fall, as if it meant to rise no more, 
dyeing all the air about it with blood. And 
then you shall hear the fainting tempest die in 
the hollow of the night, and you shall see a 
green halo kindling on the summit of the east- 
ern hills, brighter — brighter yet, till the large 
white circle of the slow moon is lifted up among 
the barred clouds, step by step, line by line, star 



EUREKA. 29 

after star she quenches with her kindling light, 
setting in their stead an army of pale, penetrable, 
fleecy wreaths in the heavens, to give light to the 
earth, which moves together, hand in hand, 
company by company, troop by troop, so meas- 
ured in their unity of motion, that the whole 
heaven seems to roll with them, and the earth 
to reel under them. And then wait yet for one 
hour, until the East again becomes purple, and 
the heaving mountains, rolling against it in dark- 
ness, like waves of a wild sea, are drowned one 
by one in the glory of its burning ; watch the 
white glaciers blaze in their winding paths about 
the mountains, like mighty serpents with scales 
of fire ; watch the columnar peaks of solitary 
snow, kindling downwards, chasm by chasm, 
each in itself a new morning ; their long ava- 
lanches cast down in keen streams brighter than 
the lightning, sending each his tribute of driven 
snow, like altar smoke, up to the heavens, the 
rose light of their silent domes flushing the 
heaven about them and above them, piercing 
with purer light through its purple lines of lifted 



30 EUREKA. 

cloud, casting a new glory on every wreath as 
it passes by, until the whole heaven — one 
scarlet canopy — is interwoven with a roof of 
waving flame, and tossing, vault beyond vault, 
as with drifted wings of many companies of 
angels ; and then, when you can look no more 
for gladness, and when you are bowed down 
with fear and love of the Maker and Doer of 
this, tell me who has best delivered this message 
unto men ! 

The grand old mountains and hills seem to 
have been built for the human race as at once 
their schools and their cathedrals; full of treas- 
ures of illuminated manuscript for the scholar, 
kindly in simple lessons to the worker, quiet in 
pale cloisters for the thinker, glorious in holi- 
ness for the worshiper. 

Three great offices are accredited to mount- 
ains and hills in order to preserve the health, and 
increase the happiness of mankind. 

1st. The mountains and hills give motion to 
water, so that men can build their cities in the 
midst of fields which will always be fertile, and 



EUREKA. 31 

establish their lines of commerce on streams 
which will not fail. 

2d. Mountains maintain a constant change 
in the currents of the air ; mountains divide the 
earth not only into districts, but into climates, 
and cause perpetual currents of air to traverse 
their passes, and ascend or descend their 
ravines, altering both the temperature and 
nature of the air in many ways, moistening it 
with the spray of their waterfalls, sucking it 
down and beating it hither and thither in the 
pool of their torrents, closing it within clefts 
and caves, where the sunbeams never reach, till 
it is as cold as November mists ; then sending 
it forth again to breathe softly across the slopes 
of velvet fields, or to be scorched among sun- 
burnt shales and shapeless crags; then drawing 
it back in moaning swirls through clefts of ice, 
and up into dewy wreaths above the snow-fields ; 
then piercing it with strange electric darts and 
flashes of mountain fires, and tossing it high in 
fantastic storm-clouds as the dried grass is 
tossed in the hay-field by the mower, only suffer- 



32 EUREKA. 

ing it to depart at last, when chastened and 
pure, to refresh the faded air of the far-off 
plains. 

The third great use of mountains is to cause 
perpetual change in the soils of the earth. 
Without such provision, the ground under culti- 
vation would, in a series of years, become 
exhausted, and require to be upturned laboriously 
by the hand of man. But the elevations of the 
earth's surface provide for it a perpetual renova- 
tion. The higher mountains suffer their sum- 
mits to be broken into fragments, and to be 
cast down in sheets of massy rock, full, as we 
shall see presently, of every substance necessary 
for the nourishment of plants. These fragments 
are again broken by frost, and ground by 
torrents, into various condition of sand and 
clay — materials which are distributed perpetually 
by the streams farther and farther from the 
mountain's base. Every shower which swells 
the streams carries portions of earth to new 
positions, and expose new banks of ground to 
be washed away at each succeeding rise. As 



EUREKA. 33 

the stream goes plunging madly on, tearing 
down banks and rocks along its margin, it is but 
forwarding Nature in its course, and is neces- 
sary to the existence of Man, and to the beauty 
of the earth. Each filtering thread of summer 
rain which trickles through soft sod of the higher 
lands, carries the appointed burden of earth 
down to the new and natural garden in the plain 
below. Mountains and hills stand as the re- 
serve to supply the hard-worked lowlands, as 
they continually drop from their bounties, the 
virgin earth, into the lap spread for its reception. 
That which we so often lament as convulsion or 
destruction, is nothing else but the momentary 
shaking of the dust from the spade. The wintry 
floods, which inflict a temporary devastation, 
bear with them the elements of succeeding fer- 
tility; the fruitful field is covered with sand and 
shingles in momentary judgment, but in endur- 
ing mercy ; and the great river or stream which 
chokes its mouth with marsh, and tosses terror 
along its shore, is but scattering the seeds of 
the harvests of futurity and preparing the seats for 



34 EUREKA. 

unborn generations. We often frame our ideas of 
fearfulness and sublimity alternately from the 
mountains and the sea ; but how unjustly we 
associate them! The sea wave, with all its 
beneficience, is yet devouring and terrible ; but 
the silent wave of the blue mountain is lifted 
towards heaven in a stillness of perpetual 
mercy ; and the one surge, unfathomable in its 
darkness; the other, unshaken in its faithfulness, 
forever bear the seal of the appointed symbol : 

"Thy righteousness is like the great mountain; 
Thy judgments are a great deep." 

The great Builder of the universe was not 
content to give man a dull, monotonous land- 
scape upon which to dwell, but in order to dis- 
play the Creation in such a manner as to awaken 
the divine in man's nature. The mountain and 
hills stand forth with cleft side, portraying how 
fearfully and wonderfully God has wrought in 
the world's composition. Notice again, where 
the soil is rich and the climate soft, the hills are 
low and safe ; but where the ground is poorer 
and the air keener, they rise into forms of more 



EUREKA. 35 

peril and pride, and their utmost terror is shown 
only where their fragments fall on trackless ice, 
and the thunder of their ruin can be heard only 
by the ibex and eagle, while the grand old hills 
lift up their heads, and we look upon them with 
awe as the work of our Creator, ordained by Him 
for the help of man, with their thousand voices 
hymning his praise. The whispering winds bear 
the sad refrain: " Hear, oh ye mountains, the 
Lord's controversy!" and still thought un- 
bidden comes, that their gulfs of thawless ice, 
and unretarded roar of tormented waves, and 
deathful falls of fruitless waste and unredeemed 
decay, must be the image of the souls of those 
who have chosen the darkness, and whose cry 
shall be to the mountains to fall on them, and to 
the hills to cover them ; and still, to the end of 
time, the clear waters of the unfailing springs, 
and the white pasture lilies in their clothed 
multitude, — and the abiding of the burning 
peaks in their nearness to the opened heaven, 
shall be the types, and the blessings, of those 
who have chosen light, and of whom it is 



36 EUREKA. 

written : " The mountains shall bring peace to 
the people, and the little hills righteousness. " 
From the mountain peaks cast your eyes 
upon, and consider what we owe merely to the 
grass — to the covering of the dark ground by 
that glorious enamel ; by the companies of those 
soft, and countless, and peaceful spears. The 
fields of grass, with their spring and summer; 
the walks of silent, scented paths ; their wel- 
come in the noonday heat ; the joyous herds 
and flocks that graze; the power and beauty 
given to the shepherd life ; the life of sunlight 
upon the world, falling in emerald streaks, and 
failing in soft, blue shadows where else it would 
have struck upon the dark mould or scorching 
dust ; pastures beside the pacing brooks ; soft 
banks and knolls and lowly hills; crisp lawns, 
all dim with early dew or smooth in evening 
warmth of barred sunlight, dinted by happy 
feet, and softening in their fall the sound of lov- 
ing voices — all these are summed in those 
simple words. And these are not all ; but once 
more come with me, and at eventide let us pass 



EUREKA. 37 

over the purling brook, through the meadow, 
studded here and there with new-mown heaps, 
filling all the air with fainter sweetness ; look up 
towards the higher hills, where waves of ever- 
lasting green roll silently into their love inlets 
among the shadows of the trees; and then 
think and judge whether of all the gorgeous 
flowers that beam in summer air, and of all 
strong and goodly trees, pleasant to the eyes 
and good for food — stately palm and pine, strong 
ash and oak, scented citron, burdened vine — 
there be any by man so deeply loved, by God 
so highly graced, as that narrow point of feeble 
green. Yet this is the carpet spread for his 
creatures. We have the bare ground in its 
season, to vary and kill the monotony of the 
weary march of life's pilgrimage; but between 
the seasons of the bare ground, and the green 
grass, we have the varied hues of autumn, and 
the bloom and bird-song of spring. 

We will next view the earth from an 
astronomic standpoint. 



ASTRONOMY. 

This is the science which teaches the know- 
ledge of celestial bodies, their magnitude, mo- 
tions, distances, periods of revolution, eclipse, 
order, and of the causes of their various phe- 
nomena. Thales, one of the seven wise men of 
Greece, who lived six hundred years before the 
Christian era, was the first regular teacher of 
astronomy. Next, and shortly after, Pytha- 
goras, another Greek, taught this science at 
Crotona. About three hundred years after 
Thales first taught it, Hipparchus became a 
distinguished teacher of it in Egypt. Ptolemey 
of Alexandria, one hundred and thirty years 
before the Christian era, acquired still greater 
distinction as such a teacher. The theories 
taught by him were entertained and adopted as 
the true ones, till Copernicus of Prussia, in 
fifteen hundred and thirty, revived the Pytha- 
gorean Theory of Planetary Motion ; viz : That 



EUREKA. 39 

the Sun is the central orb of the system, and 
that all the planets revolve around him, which 
is accepted as the true theory. Tycho Brahe, 
of Denmark, was of very great assistance in the 
use of instruments in astronomical observations. 
Kepler, a German astronomer, discovered the 
three great laws of planetary motion. So also 
did Galileo, with the aid of the telescope, make 
new and highly interesting discoveries. Sir 
Isaac Newton made known the application of 
the principle of gravitation, which governs and 
controls all worlds and heavenly systems. 

The diagram on the following page gives the 
relative positions of the primary planets. 



EUREKA. 41 

They were named after heathen gods and 
goddesses. Mercury, which is nearest the sun, 
was named after the god of dishonesty and in- 
justice. Venus, the second, was named after 
the goddess of love and beauty. Mars, the 
fourth, was named after the god who was sup 
posed to rule over war and battle ; Jupiter, the 
fifth, received his name after the imaginary 
being, that was supposed to be god over all ; 
Saturn, the sixth, obtained his name from the 

imaginary being who was supposed to preside 

» 

over time and chronology ; Uranus, the seventh, 
obtained his name from the god of astronomy ; 
and Neptune, the outermost planet from the 
Sun, was named after the imaginary deity that 
was supposed to preside over the seas. 

The following scale gives the time it takes 
each planet to revolve around the Sun. 

Mercury, eighty-eight days. 

Venus, two hundred and twelve days. 

Earth, three hundred and sixty-five and one- 
fourth days. 

Mars, twenty-three months. 



42 EUREKA. 

Jupiter, twelve years. 

Saturn, thirty years. 

Uranus, eighty-four years. 

Neptune, one hundred and sixty-four years. 

Between Mars and Jupiter, are the asteroids, 
small planets, which revolve around the Sun as 
their center of motion. Nearly all of them are 
invisible to the naked eye, but all may be seen 
by the aid of the telescope. Kepler, the Ger- 
man astronomer, is supposed to be the astrono- 
mer who first led to the discovery of the asteroids. 
The distance between the Sun and Mercury, was 
so great, that jf it was doubled, it would be 
nearly the distance from the Sun to Venus, and 
and if it was multiplied by three, it would nearly 
give the distance, from the Sun to the Earth ; 
but when he applied this rule to the distance 
between the Sun and Jupiter, the space between 
Mars and Jupiter was too great to conform to 
this law. (see diagram.) This led him to believe 
that the space was filled by unknown planets, 
which is now known as so many little worlds, 
over eighty in number. The secondary planets 



EUREKA. 43 

are represented in the diagram by the small 
spots which surround the primary planets, as 
they travel around the Sun. Our Moon is one 
of them, and the only one that revolves around 
the Earth. 

Jupiter has four of them, which revolves 
around him at different periods. Saturn, the 
sixth, has eight moons, or satellites, that revolve 
around him. Herschel or Uranus, has six 
moons, and Neptune has two moons. The 
moons of the different planets are different dis- 
tances from them, travel with different rates of 
speed, and have different periods. Comets are 
rare bodies which revolve around the Sun, and 
are seldom seen only when they are near him. 

The Sun is the central orb of our system, and 
is about fourteen hundred thousand times larger 
than the earth, and is the great source of light 
and heat, which gives light and heat to all the 
planets and bodies that revolve around him. 

Mercury is said to be about thirty-one hun- 
dred miles in diameter, and makes a revolution 
around the Sun in about eighty-eight days, and 



44 EUREKA. 

is thirty-seven millions of miles distant from him. 
His days and nights are nearly the same length 
as ours, and it is not known, whether or not, he 
has change of seasons. His physical constitu- 
tion is probably much the same as that of the 
earth. 

Venus, is one-seventh smaller than the earth. 
She rises as the morning star for two hundred 
and ninety-two days before the Sun, and as an 
evening star sets after him for the same length 
of time. She has eight seasons ; two Springs, 
two Summers, two Autumns, and two Winters, at 
her equator ; and four at the circles that divide 
the torrid from the temperate zones. 

The earth resembles an orange in form, being 
flattened at its poles, so that it is twenty-six 
miles shorter between its poles, than it is from 
the equator on one side, to the equator on the 
other. It is surrounded with an atmosphere 
about fifty miles in depth, and has four seasons 
in its temperate zones, and two, summer and 
winter, about its poles. Its diameter is nearly 



EUREKA. 45 

eight thousand miles, and, consequently its 
circumference is about twenty-five thousand. 
It revolves around the sun in one year, and 
rotates on its axis in twenty-four hours. 
Prior to the sixteenth century, and the dis- 
coveries of Copernicus, astronomy and astrono- 
mers, with but few exceptions, regarded the 
earth as the greatest of the works of creation, 
round which the sun and moon, planets and 
stary heavens revolved. But this idea was 
dispelled when Sir Isaac Newton applied the 
law of gravitation to the heavenly bodies, where- . 
by the relative weights of the sun and the 
planets could be determined, elements which 
enable us to prove that the earth has an annual 
motion, as appears by the preceding diagram, 
where the different planets are attracted toward 
the sun, and each other with forces respectively 
equal to the amount of matter each contains, 
and the distance they are apart, which enables 
them to keep up their revolutions. If a lever 
or beam is equally balanced on a point, and a 
light weight placed upon one end of the lever 



46 EUREKA. 

or beam, and a heavy weight on the other end, 
and then started to revolve around the point on 
which the same was balanced, they will revolve 
around a common center of gravity, but the 
lighter weight will describe the larger circle and 
the heavy one the smaller circle. By applying 
this principle to the sun and the earth, it may 
be plain that the earth has an annual motion 
around him. His weight is ascertained to be 
three hundred and fifty-five thousand times 
greater than that of the earth, and consequently 
his attractive force that much greater. This 
being the case, the center of gravity of these 
two bodies cannot be very far from the center 
of the sun ; and as it is apparent that one or the 
other does revolve in an extended orbit, it is 
evident that it is not the sun, but the earth, 
that has the annual motion, thus varying the 
day's length. 

The plane of the equator of the earth on the 
twentieth of March, when the days and nights 
are equal, passes directly through the center of 
the sun. For three successive months from 



EUREKA. 47 

this time the sun appears to be moving 
slowly northward, till he arrives at a point at 
which he appears to stand still, when the days 
are at greatest length. During the next period 
of about three months he appears to move 
slowly southward, till on the twenty-third of 
September, the plane of the earth's equator 
again passes through the center of the sun, 
when the days and nights are again equal. For 
a period of three months more he appears to 
move in the same direction, till he again appears 
to stand still, when the days are at their shortest, 
During the period of the next three months, he 
appears to move northward till he arrives at the 
point which he left. 

The earth is surrounded by a belt of atmos- 
phere supposed to be about fifty miles from the 
surface of the earth. Notwithstanding it is 
rarified by heat, it satisfies every demand that 
is made upon it by the animal and vegetable 
kingdom. The earth is one of the primary 
planets, and is composed of solid material, and 
is warmed by the heat of the sun. So are all 



48 EUREKA. 

the other primary planets. If the earth has an 
atmosphere, and is visited with rain, hail, snow 
and frost, why not they ? If the earth has riv- 
ers, oceans, seas and continents, why not her 
companions, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, 
Saturn, Herschel, and Neptune? And if she 
runs an annual course around the sun, so do 
they. And lastly, the earth being inhabited, is it 
not Tair to conclude that they are inhabited also ? 
The Creator of the world, in his divine econ- 
omy, does no idle thing, but every act is in the 
furtherance of a divine plan, and why should he 
make these worlds with such adaptation for 
human habitation, if they were uninhabited sol- 
itudes, and so to remain forever? When to us 
the very "heavens declare his glory, and day 
unto day uttereth speech, while night unto night 
showeth knowledge/ ' The whole system of 
worlds, moving like one grand machine, with 
no variableness, filling the lap of luxury and 
supplying the wants of man, as daily and yearly 
the planets roll on in their course from West to 
East, and Mercury, Venus, the Earth, Mars, 



EUREKA. 49 

Jupiter and Saturn rotate in the same direction 
on their axis, the first four of which rotate on 
their axis in nearly equal periods of twenty 
four hours each, while the latter two in periods 
of about ten hours each, making daylight and 
night at the equator of the former an average 
of twelve hours each, while at the equator of 
the latter about five hours each. 

The general configuration of the earth's sur- 
face is spherical, or globular. This, Mr. Green 
says, is correct, but says the proofs given by 
scientists for the same does not prove the fact. 

The proofs offered by Newton and adopted 
by others, are, that " we can see so small a por- 
tion of the earth's surface at once, that its curv- 
ature is not visible, but when a ship sails from 
us, the hull first disappears from view, then the 
lower parts of the masts, and last, their tops." 
This "they say" would not be the case if the 
surface of the water were flat, like the top of a 
table. Hence, we conclude the earth is round." 
Mr. Green's theory is, that it is the density of 
the atmosphere near the surface of the earth 



50 EUREKA. 

which obstructs the view of the ship's hull, and 
not the rotundity of the earth's surface. And 
to my mind, the evidence so offered by scientists, 
as to the ship's masts, is not as conclusive evi- 
dence of the roundness of the world, as that of 
where a person is lost in a wilderness, with no 
guide as to his course, but walking forward at 
random, he will travel in a circle ; or, the evi- 
dence adduced by the author. But, as the 
fact of the earth's being a globe is not disputed, 
we leave this subject. 



MOON. 
When the moon is between us and the sun in 
the west, she is at her change, and is invisible. 
When she moves eastward ninety degrees, we 
can see one fourth of her surface enlightened ; 
and when she moves ninety degrees farther, we 
can see the, half of her whole surface enlight- 
ened. By continuing the revolution around 
the earth, she manifests less of her enlightened 
surface till she becomes invisible again in the 
west. She makes about twelve and one-third 
of these revolutions around the earth in one year. 
So she must, of course, move in her orbit at 
times with greater velocity than the earth, as 
she has a much greater distance to travel. This 
fact can be readily understood if we remember 
that she revolves around the earth as the earth 
does around the sun. 

HAS THE MOON AN ATMOSPHERE? 

If the moon had an atmosphere, it would 



52 EUREKA. 

change the direction of the rays of light, if they 
should pass through it ; but no such influence is 
preceptible on the rays of light coming from 
fixed stars as they pass by the edge of the 
moon to our eyes. They move in straight 
lines, thereby indicating that they do not pass 
through any transparent material medium out- 
side of the earth's atmosphere. An object 
three hundred and sixty feet in diameter 
may be seen on the moon's surface by the aid 
of a telescope, and as her poles are nearly at 
right angles with the plane of her orbit, it 
must be constantly cold in her artic regions, 
which would be visible if she had an atmos- 
phere and they were there. But they have 
never been discovered. Neither clouds nor 
changes of any kind which would indicate the 
presence of human intelligence ; neither animal 
nor vegetable life. 



COMETS 

Existed hundreds of years before the Christian 
Era. They were mentioned by the Greek, 
Roman, Chinese, and other ancient writers. 
Their relation to the solar system was unknown ; 
the causes of their near approach to us were 
unaccounted for ; where they came from or 
went to were problems none could solve. These 
apparently lawless wanderers have been dis- 
covered to be loyal to their Creator in following 
the pathway assigned them and fulfilling the 
end of their existence in the ecomony of nature. 
It is not known certainly to scientists what the 
tail-like appearance of the comet consists of. Sir 
Isaac Newton imagined they were a thin vapor 
rising from the heated nucleus, as smoke ascends 
from the earth ; while Dr. Hamilton supposed 
that they were streams of electricity excited and 
dispersed by the influence of solar heat; but 
these conjectures have not satisfied the inquiring 



54 EUREKA. 

mind, neither can either one of them be main- 
tained by any principle in science or natur- 
al phenomena, as they have been presented. 
Mr. Green's theory is different from those pre- 
sented, and seems by far the most plausible. 

Comets have, in former years by many, and 
not a few persons in the present day, been 
watched with a dread, as a forerunner of 
destruction and messenger of death, rushing 
recklessly among the planets, with which it 
might at any moment collide and disorganize all 
nature. But such fears are groundless; as it 
has been discovered that they obey the law of 
gravitation. Prof. Whiston, it is said, "charged 
one with avenging the iniquities of the antedi- 
luvians by producing the flood, and with carving 
up the surface of the earth with its tail, so that it 
now appears with its heights and hollows, like a 
prodigy of misery. Some, again, looked upon 
them as the forerunners of war and pestilence, 
while others, again, looked upon them as disem- 
bodied spirits clothed with fiery indignation, 
or the final abode of itself of such as are 



EUREKA. 55 

consigned to the never-ending torment of the 
Divine displeasure." 

When the comet of 1402 became visible, the 
Turks were fast gaining victories in Europe, 
while Satan himself was supposed to be using 
the Turkish arms against the Church. A gen- 
eral gloom settled upon them because of a fear 
of their approaching doom, and the people 
became anxious only for the future, so when the 
comet of last year put in its appearance and 
tarried so long visible, while many gazed upon it 
in the gray dawn of morning, the wicked and 
profligate became alarmed, and serious thoughts 
of what their future must be, dying in their sins, 
and they were heard crying in prayer for 
forgiveness to God, with pledges to a better 
life in future. 

Some supposed, in olden times, that comets 
were the prison-house of the Evil One and his 
confederates, who were alternately burned and 
frozen by approaching and receding from the 
sun. And as evidence of this, many imagined 
that they could see, in the darker parts of their 



56 EUREKA. 

tails, the struggling of fiends and the dingy- 
clothes of the devil. Although many to this 
day look upon them as the bearers of disease, 
yet science has discovered that the wisdom 
that directs them is infinite, and the power 
which controls them is the same omnipotent 
power which leads the universe in its various 
movements, according to the fixed plan of its 
Creator in the beginning. 

The planets travel in elliptical orbits 
around the sun, and the sun occupies a focus 
common to all of them. As evidence, the 
sun looks larger when the earth is in the 
perhelion point of her orbit than he will six 
months hence, when the earth is in her 
aphelion, and he will grow constantly less or 
larger as the earth travels to and from each of 
these points. This apparent increase or decrease 
of size indicates that at the points from which he 
has been observed he has been at unequal 
distances from the earth, fully verifying the 
fact that the orbit of the earth is not circular 
but elliptical in form. 



GEOLOGY. 

Geology treats of the order of succession 
in the strata of the earth's crust, and of the 
changes that were going on during the forma- 
tion of each bed or stratum ; that is, of the 
changes in the oceans and the land; of the 
changes in the atmosphere and climate ; of the 
changes in the plants and animals. In other 
words, it is a historical view of the events that 
took place during the earth's progress, derived 
from the study of the successive rocks. In the 
Mosaic account of the creation of the world, we 
find it is comprised in seven distinct orders of 
being, in seven different periods of time. 

1st. There was first an age, or division of 
time, when there was no life on the globe. 
The earth was without form and void. 

2d. The next age, shells, corals, crinoids and 
tribolites, abounded in the ocean, and no 
terrestrial life. 



58 EUREKA. 

3rd. In the next age, in addition to the 
above, there were fishes in the water, and the 
lands, though yet small, began to be covered 
with vegetation. 

4th. There was next an age when the conti- 
nents were at many successive times largely dry 
or marshy land, and the land was densely 
overgrown with trees, shrubs, and smaller 
plants, of the remains of which plants the great 
coal beds were made. In animal life there were 
besides the kinds already mentioned, various 
Amphibians and some other reptiles of inferior 
tribes. 

5th. In the next age reptiles were by far 
more abundant, and their variety, size and rank 
excelled those of the present day. 

6th. There was next an age when the reptiles 
had dwindled, and quadrupeds were in great 
numbers over the continents ; and the size of 
these quadrupeds, like that of the reptiles in the 
preceding age, was far greater than the size of 
those of the present day. 

7th. Then came man ; and the progress of 



EUREKA. 59 

life here ended — until God's seventh day of rest 
shall end, and a new creation begins. 

The creation, as demonstrated by geology, 
points to boundless wisdom in every step of 
progress, and with increasing distinctness as the 
era approaches when man should appear and 
receive the divine command, "Subdue and have 
dominion," Creation finished, the day of rest 
followed. The era of the finished world, the 
era also of man's progress and preparation for 
another and a brighter life. 

Hugh Miller says, that after each day's work 
of God in creating the world he waited a long 
period of time for each day's work to develop 
into a higher scale of organic life, and when it 
had so developed he commenced another day's 
creation, still higher than the last, his crowning 
act being the creation of man. He rested on 
the seventh day, that being the present time, 
and when we have developed to a certain de- 
gree of perfection, then God will commence a 
new day's creation, and this will be our millen- 
ium. 



60 EUREKA. 

As we look around us, see, and take notes of 
the rapid strides the arts and sciences have been 
making in the last few years, it would seem that 
we had almost reached the limit. The modes 
of travel — the facilities for communicating far 
and near — printing facilities — mails — telegraph 
— telephone, etc. — domestic machinery, such 
as sewing machines, etc. — the farming imple- 
ments, reaper, mower, thresher, etc. — in fact 
all kinds of machinery. But we do not stop 
at this. Through scientific researches facts have 
been obtained, the reasoning upon which have 
developed fixed laws which govern and control 
the universe. 

Geology is the science which treats of the 
structure and mineral constitution of the globe, 
and its history. The miner finds in it a torch to 
guide him in his subterranean passage to the 
stratum where he may expect to find coal or 
iron, or to the recovery of the mineral vein 
which he has suddenly lost. The engineer is 
guided by it in tracing out his roads or canals, 
as it tells him at once the firmest stratum for 



EUREKA. *61 

supporting the one, and the easiest to cut 
through for the other, and makes him ac- 
quainted with the qualities of the material he 
should use in his construction, and the localities 
where he should seek them. The geographer 
finds his inquiries facilitated by learning from 
geology the influence of the mineral masses on 
the form and magnitude of mountains and valleys, 
and the course of rivers. The agriculturist is 
taught the influence of the mineral strata upon 
vegetation and animal life, and the statesman 
discovers in the effects of this influence a force 
which stimulates or retards population. So this 
science is capable of the widest and most 
practical application. 

To obtain an idea of the earth's formation 
and original condition, we must treat Geology 
as a branch of the physical sciences. The earth, 
as one of the planetary bodies revolving round 
the center of our solar system, must, like all the 
other planets, be subject to the great laws by 
which they are at once retained in their orbits 
and caused to revolve on their axes ; it is only 



62 EUREKA. 

one member of a great whole, and in its dens- 
ity, its volume, and its mass, is in strict relation 
to all the other bodies of the same system. The 
first formation, therefore, of the earth, or the 
manner in which it was probably condensed 
from nebulous matter, and reduced to the plan- 
etary form, may be considered a portion of 
Astronomical Science. 

The term Geology naturally suggests to the 
mind inquiries: ist, into the formation and 
original condition of the earth ; secondly, into 
the successive modifications which it has under- 
gone, and the agencies by which they have 
been effected ; and into its present condition, 
and the agencies which are still producing 
changes in that condition. 

A science is practically valuable just in pro- 
portion as its facts have been discovered, and 
its laws established and studied ; for, so long as 
we are uncertain whether a known result has 
proceeded from a definite cause, we are unable 
to apply the fact or circumstance to the eluci- 
dation of other facts or circumstances; and so 



EUREKA. 63 

long as we are unacquainted with the properties 
of any substance under our examination, we 
cannot declare with certainty what share it may 
have had in the phenomena we have observed. 
It can be easily shown that the practical im- 
portance of Geology is the result of its philo- 
sophical connection with the exact sciences. 
For example, were all the deposits we meet 
with, here rock and there sand, gravel, and 
clay, mere arbitrary heaps which had never 
been brought under controlling influences of 
organic or inorganic forces, we should be un- 
able to use the one as an index to the history of 
the other, and the study of each individual 
deposit would end as it had begun — in itself 
alone. But, if it be proved that certain phys- 
ical agencies have, according to fixed laws, been 
in operation from the earliest periods of our 
planet's history, and that they have either co- 
operated with, or acted upon, organic beings, 
so as to check, modify, or destroy, at successive 
epochs, animal and vegetable life — and if in the 
strata themselves we can find the fossilized 



64 EUREKA. 

relics of successive races of organized beings, 
and can make the one a guide to the other — 
how different the result ! uncertainty now giving 
place to certainty, and a knowledge of the strata 
of one portion of the earth's crust becoming a 
clue to the investigation of the strata of any 
other. It is upon this certainty, obtained by 
the collection and collocation of facts from all 
parts of the world, that Geology rests its claim 
on the attention of practical men. 

And the inquiry into the condition of the 
earth's crust, from the great variety of its char- 
acters of mineral matter, shows it must have 
been produced under circumstances equally 
varied. The Geologists have discovered the 
affinity between lavas now erupted by still 
active volcanoes, and the streams poured out by 
the volcanoes of other times, and have ascer- 
tained that crystalline massive rocks, granites, 
et cetera, were brought to view at various 
distinct epochs, and were therefore connected 
with distinct historic periods of the earth's 
changes ; and finally, they have observed and 



EUREKA. 65 

exemplified the alterations effected in the struc- 
ture of mere sedimentary deposits of the com- 
bined action of heat and pressure, which have 
produced that crystalline structure so common 
in the metamorphic rocks. 

The knowledge thus acquired and the proofs 
obtained of a certain sequence and progression 
in mineral deposits, would not alone have en- 
abled geologists to determine that the alterna- 
ting disturbances and changes shadowed forth 
were events antecedent to man's occupancy of 
the earth ; but he has found in his researches 
other evidence, and whilst examining the min- 
eral structure of the earth, has found traces of 
former inhabitants in the many shells and other 
organic relics imbeded in its strata, and the con- 
clusions formed were that the fossils found in 
any stratum are the relics of animals living at, 
or about the time when the stratum was depos- 
ited or formed. 2d, The strata not being 
parts of one confused mass, but following 
each other in a distinct progression, and 
the difference of their mineral character in- 



G6 EUREKA. 

dicating marked differences in the conditions 
of deposit, it must be assumed that the 
animals which supplied the organic relics they 
contain lived at successive and often widely- 
separated epochs. 3d, As the organic differ- 
ences observable in these relics of animals of 
other times exceed in amount and kind any 
probable, nay possible, variation of specific 
characters proceeding from the influence of local 
circumstances, it must be admitted that at each 
stage of the earth's history there was a distinct 
and peculiar assemblage of organic beings which, 
from causes not clearly known to us in a final 
sense, became extinct and were replaced by 
others. 

Geology, therefore, explains to us the history 
of the organic as well as the mineral changes of 
the earth, and having established a connection 
between the two at various epochs, embodies 
the knowledge thus acquired in a distinct shape, 
not limited by time, but by circumstances, 
giving a history of the changes which took 
place in the earth's surface, of the volcanic 



EUREKA. 67 

eruptions, the various deposits formed by rivers, 
lakes and seas, the modifications effected by the 
action of currents or the beating waves of the 
sea, and of the animals which extemporaneously 
existed, at an epoch which, though we cannot 
state its antiquity by years of time, was evi- 
dently, by the position of the strata, posterior 
to some, anterior to other, formations. 

The practical utility of geological formations 
when thus established is this, that having once 
ascertained that the conditions of the earth were 
favorable at peculiar epochs to the production 
of certain mineral changes, and the existence of 
peculiar organic structure, and that creative 
power had called into existence the animals and 
plants which were suited to such conditions, 
and left them imbued with powers of enduring 
only a limited amount of change, it becomes 
practicable to proceed in an inverse order and 
to determine the geological age of any stratum 
from the relics of animals and plants it contains, 
and even to use the knowledge of the condition 
of the earth's surface at a particular epoch, 



68 EUREKA. 

which is derived from study of the organic 
remains of the strata formed within it, to esti- 
mate the probability of finding other substances 
whether mineral or organic, metals or coal, to 
the existence of which that condition appears 
equally favorable. 

The vestiges of ancient river and lake wear 
may also be discovered in one place referred to 
by geologists, as the parallel roads of Glenroy, 
which show remarkable masses of rock that at- 
test the ancient wear of waters. These roads are 
ancient shelves or beaches, formed at the 
margin of a former lake, and at levels corres- 
ponding to its successive depressions. The high- 
est is 1,250 feet above the sea, the next about 
1,000, and the third 50 feet lower. Sir C. 
Lyell remarks, that among other proofs that the 
parallel roads have really been formed along 
the margin of a sheet of water, it may be men- 
tioned that wherever an isolated hill rises in the 
middle of the glen above the level of any par- 
ticular shelf, a corresponding shelf is seen at 
the same level, passing around the hill, as 



EUREKA. 69 

would have happened if it had once formed an 
island in a lake. 

The great lakes of America exhibit similar 
beaches at various elevations above their present 
surface ; the absence of marine shells concurring 
with other circumstances to remove such accu- 
mulations from the list, either of ordinary marine 
beaches or of sea banks. 

In their endeavoring to trace out the sequence 
of stratefied deposits, the Geologist has been 
led to discover and examine the various changes 
which the earth y s crust has undergone at succes- 
sive epochs, in its alternate rising and sinking 
before him. That the earth was once a melted 
mass I believe is no longer doubted, and that it 
is gradually cooling off and shrinking up, I think 
is a reasonable proposition, as an examination 
of the temperature of the earth's crust at various 
depths, shows that the temperature below the 
cooled surface increases on descending, and that 
at great depths there is still existing a vast reser- 
voir of internal heat. From numerous observ- 
ations made in mines and by Artesian wells in 



70 EUREKA. 

France, England, Prussia, Russia and elsewhere, 
Leonard states that the temperature increases 
by two and one-quarter degrees Fahrenheit in 
one hundred and twenty feet. M. Reich con- 
siders the temperature in the mines of Saxony 
to increase one and four-fifth degrees in one 
hundred and thirty-five feet. In a boring in the 
military schools at Paris the increase was found 
to be one and four-fifth degrees in ninety-six 
feet. In this country, especially in the oil re- 
gions, the increase is still greater. But, from 
the data given it may be assumed that the tem- 
perature increases one degree Fahrenheit in sixty 
feet depth, and if the rate of increase were 
considered constant, there would, at sixty thou- 
sand feet be a temperature of one thousand 
degrees, or that of low red heat ; but as the 
temperature will increase with the depth in an 
augmenting ratio, Leonard assumes that this 
temperature would be attained at about thirty- 
five thousand feet, being a depth only double 
the height of Cotopaxi, the most remarkable 
of the Peruvian volcanoes. Descending still 



EUREKA. 71 

lower, the temperature, at a very moderate 
depth compared with the magnitude of the 
earth, would be found sufficient to retain mineral 
matter in a state of fusion ; and it is therefore 
unnecessary to place at a great depth the source 
of the lava which is still pouring out in so many 
parts of the earth. The similarity of lava, 
wherever found, and the close agreement as to 
composition and physical characters of the vasalt 
of ancient epochs, and of that still bursting 
through and intersecting the walls of modern vol- 
canoes, are further proof that all such eruptions 
have a common origin, and are due, as well as 
the accompanying physical phenomena of earth- 
quakes, to force acting on the still liquid portions 
of the earth. 

If, then, the original igneous fluidity of the 
earth, and its gradual cooling from the crust 
downwards be admitted, it has been demonstra- 
ted by Fourier, that the cooling of the earth 
and the increase of temperature in proportion 
to the depth below the surfarce, has been much 
greater formerly than it is now, and that more 



72 EUREKA. 

than thirty thousand years will be required to 
lessen, by one-half, the present rate of increase 
of temperature ; that is, to reduce the increase 
to one-half degree in sixty feet. The effect of 
the central heat is now scarcely perceptible on 
the surface. The ground, however, will not freeze 
to any great depth. 

I think the author is correct in his assertion 
that Noah's flood was not the first one the earth 
had ever seen. The world was undoubtedly 
covered with water up to the close of the second 
day of creation, as then God gave the command, 
"Let the waters under the heaven be gathered 
together unto one place, and let the dry land 
appear/' and the command was obeyed. There 
is no doubt but the deposits of ' ' conglomerate " 
• matter upon the high hills were dropped from 
or raked off the bottoms of icebergs floating 
over them. I visited a place in Western New 
York, about five miles from Olean, in Cattarau- 
gus County, where I found much of this " con- 
glomerate/' which their State Geologists say are 
the highest rock in the State. It is composed 



EUREKA. 73 

entirely of a mixture of coarse white sand and 
white quartz pebbles, of nearly uniform size, and 
about one inch and a quarter long, by about 
three-fourths of an inch in diameter, egg-shape. 
Several of these conglomerate blocks are here, 
ranging in size from ten to twenty-five feet 
square ; they have the appearance of at one 
time being all in one mass, but crumbling of the 
foundation has caused the separation. The crack 
separating them was as even and straight as if 
done by the hand of an artisan. We tried to 
break off small pieces of the huge masses, and 
although composed of the pebbles and sand, 
they were so firmly cemented together we failed. 
The place is known as Rock City, and is reached 
by a gradual ascent on the northwest side, which 
leads out upon their top, where the ascent ter- 
minates abruptly at an elevation of about seven 
hundred feet. The condition of the pebbles in 
their round, smooth dress, indicate its cause as 
the friction of water. If this be so, then the 
hills were there before the water, and could not 
have been made by it as it receded. 



74 U EKA. 

The question of gravity, is one upon which 
hangs a great deal of the mysteries of this world. 
Science teaches, that it is one and the same 
force which binds the particles of a pebble to- 
gether and makes it fall to the ground ; which 
molds the tear and bids it trickle from its source ; 
which gives the earth and all heavenly bodies 
their globular shape, and makes them revolve 
in their orbit. How sublime the thought, that 
this one simple principle, that gives form to a 
drop, extends its influence through the immen- 
sity of space, and so marshals the hosts of 
heaven, that without the least interruption or 
discord, they all hold on their course from year 
to year, and from age to age ! It is thus that 
Omnipotence makes the simplest means to pro- 
duce the grandest and most multiform result. 
Did you ever think, when called upon to do so 
simple a thing as to drop a certain number of 
drops from a liquid into a spoon, that the size 
of those drops are limited by the attraction of 
gravity ? Well, it is so. When the drop reaches 
a certain size it falls, because it is so heavy ; or, 



EUREKA. 75 

in other words, because, with its slight cohesion, 
the attraction of the earth brings it down. It is 
cohesion that forms the drop on the lip of a vial 
as we drop medicine; cohesion between the 
particles of the liquid, and cohesion between 
these particles and those of the glass. It is 
gravitation on the other hand, that makes the 
drop fall ; it becoming so large that the force of 
gravity overcomes the cohesion between the 
drop and the vial. 

In doing so simple a thing, as carrying a load 
on the shoulder, center of gravity cannot be 
treated with impunity. Fill a bag one-fourth 
full of grain, lay the mouth of the bag over your 
shoulder, letting the filled portion hang down 
your back below your middle. You will find 
great difficulty in carrying it ; but put the 
filled portion with its weight on your shoulder, 
and keep the center of gravity over the base of 
support, and you will find the difficulty re- 
moved. 

The nearer two bodies are to each other the 
greater is the attraction. The larger and more 



76 EUREKA. 

dense the body, the more the attraction, and of 
course, the heavier it is. If the earth was larger, 
the attraction would be stronger. 

A body weighs less on the summit of a high 
mountain than it would in the valley below, 
because it is farther away from the great bulk 
of the earth, therefore, it is not so strongly at- 
tracted. 

God is a God of order. You never see dis- 
order in Nature's arrangement, except where 
necessity demands its appearance to present 
order in some other part. And that which 
appears to us as disorder in itself will, on 
examination, generally show order in the whole. 
The rocks which give so much variety to scenery 
are not piled up in confusion, and order has 
evidently reigned in their construction. Pick 
up the roughest common stone and break it. 
You will find the crystalline arrangement in its 
interior — in fact, the very soil is made up of 
separate and broken crystals. 

Having thus attempted to give an outline of 
matters upon which the author treats, I shall 



EUREKA. 77 

proceed to give his theories on the different 
points presented, which theories, he claims, are 
all original with him. Never having read on the 
subject treated, if they, or any of them, have 
ever been published, he is in ignorance of the 
fact. 



OUR WORLD. 

WHERE IT CAME FROM AND WHEN MADE. 

" In the beginning God created the heavens 
and the earth." 

(i The earth was without form and void;" At 
first it was in a misty form, or a cloud, one 
particle being larger than the other particle. 
The larger particle drew the smaller particle to 
it, forming the world. The friction and grind- 
ing of these two particles together created heat, 
which caused the particles to melt ; every par- 
ticle of the melted mass clustered as near the 
center as possible. 

If we place tin fruit cans in a dry cellar, 
though it be ever so dry, yet the cans will in 
time gather mould on them. If we lay an oil 
cloth on the ground out in some open place, on 
some beautiful night, under a clear sky, in the 
morning we find it covered with dew. W^ 



EUREKA. 79 

could not see the dew fall, nor feel it in the 
atmosphere, but the fact remains that it is there. 
The question naturally presents itself, Where 
did it come from? We answer, "Out of space.'' 
So did the earth. 

The particle containing the most power, or 
center of gravity, drew the other or weaker 
particle to it, and thus was the world created 
by God " in the beginning." 

No other worlds could have existed until the 
crust of our earth had cooled and grown suf- 
ficiently thick, so as to prevent space from 
being dried up by its heat, and moulding could 
not have taken effect until such time. 

The earth being formed then by "center of 
gravity," it was not formed by revolution, as is 
claimed by some scientists; for if the earth had 
revolved while in a melted mass, as I am 
informed Sir Isaac Newton asserts, it would not 
have gone more than two or three rounds 
before it would have flattened out like a sheet 
of paper. Then again, the earth did not revolve 
for one hundred and eighteen millions of years 



80 EUREKA. 

after its creation, which I shall be able to show 
hereafter. That it was formed by center of 
gravity is evidenced by the fact that, if you dip 
a bucket of water out of a pond, after you take 
the bucket out it will leave no hole, for the 
hole is filled up on two accounts ; the first is, 
because the water is in a liquid state, and sec- 
ond, because it wants to get nearer the center 
of gravity — therefore I think the center of 
gravity would have made the earth round. 

Science teaches that God never made^ the 
world, but that it came by nature. Infidelity 
teaches that God never made the world, but 
that it came by chance. Where then did chance 
come from but from God? The teachings of 
scientists in the past and present leads to infi- 
delity.- 



CHAPTER II. 

LIGHT BEFORE THE SUN WAS MADE. 

"And God said, let there be light; and there 
was light." 

This command was given by the Creator on 
the first day of creation, and therefore it could 
not have had reference to the sun, as it was not 
placed in the heavens until the fourth day. 
Then what gave the light in obedience to that 
command? I am told that science teaches, and 
I believe it is an admitted fact, that the earth in 
creation was a melted mass, and if it was, it 
must have been red hot. Now, if you heat a 
ball of iron red-hot and lay it out in the middle 
of some large field on a dark night, a person 
would have no difficulty in finding it while it 
continued in red-hot condition, for it would give 
light of itself, so that it is plain to be seen, and 
it is reasonable to conclude that the earth 
furnished its own light before the sun was made. 



82 EUREKA; 

m 

"And God saw the light, that it was good ; 
and God divided the light from the darkness." 

When one takes a light into a dark room, 
the darkness must take its flight, so in this case. 
The light was divided from the darkness by the 
introduction of the earth in its molten state — 
so our earth and moon was one day as bright as 
the sun is now. 

When the earth's crust had cooled so that it 
no longer furnished its own light, the smothered 
heat burst forth in volcanoes, furnishing light 
and causing vegetation to grow until the sun 
was created. 



CHAPTER III. 

earth's motion in its ORBIT. — HOW 

OBTAINED. 

The earth received its motion from God. 
It stood still until He parted with it in space, and 
it moved along in a straight line for one hundred 
and eighteen millions of years. You may take an 
object and lay it on your hand, holding it perfect- 
ly level, if no person took it off, or it did not fall 
off, or it is not misplaced by some other cause-, 
you would have to put it in motion to get rid of 
it,and when you do roll it off it goes down, and 
would keep going on down if there was nothing 
to stop it. 




The top lines of the above figure represents 
from left to right, or west to east, the plane 
along which the earth moved for one hundred and 
eighteen million of years. The lower line repre- 
sents the sun's movement in the same direction 
of the earth. It will be observed that when the 
sun was made, and first appears in its line, the 
earth represented by the small white dots, start- 
ed and travelled in its orbit around the sun. The 
figures which represent the sun on the lower line 
show the position the sun occupies within the 
earth's orbit for three revolutions of the earth. 
When the earth travels around in its orbit going 
from west to east, the sun traveling in the same 



EUREKA. 85 

direction, but very much slower, makes the east 
end of the orbit more of an ellipse than the west 
end of it ; and as the movement of the sun in 
the same direction of the earth elongates the 
orbit in the east, so for the same reason the west 
end is drawn to a true circle. 



IV. 

THE EARTH'S REVOLUTION ON ITS AXIS HOW 

OBTAINED. 

The earth's revolution on its axis was ob- 
tained from the sun's heat. This, I believe, is 
in opposition to teachings of astronomers. 
They teach that the atmosphere follows up the 
earth, while I teach that the earth follows up 
the atmosphere. I understand astronomy to 
further teach that the earth was a particle 
thrown off from the sun, and as it was thrown 
off it was thrown in a revolving motion, and 
still keeps it up to-day. But, according to my 
theory, this is not correct. We know that heat 
imparts motion. The sun shines down with a 
bright and burning light upon the earth, causing 
the atmosphere to move. You can see its 
dazzling, glimmering heat near the surface of 
the earth on a warm summer day. The 
atmosphere, having friction, cannot move 



EUREKA. 87 

without carrying the earth around with it. We 
see, then, the heated atmosphere moves towards 
the east, and as nature (science tells us) abhors 
a vacuum, the cooler atmosphere from the west 
which has not been in the sun's heat for twenty- 
four hours, comes in to fill up the vacuum. 
And if we would lay a telegraph wire down 
down from every point of the earth, and of 
water, and all points telegraph at one time to a 
given point, the result would be to find that the 
atmosphere was going as fast as the earth, and 
the earth as fast as the atmosphere. Thus you 
see it is the atmosphere that carries the earth 
around. 

For proof of this, take a pasteboard screw 
and hang it up by a pipe on a hot stove. As 
the heat ascends through the coil of the paste- 
board, it will cause it to revolve. Here the 
heat imparts motion. Or, again, take a balloon 
and let it up in the atmosphere, and it will rise 
in a perpendicular line until it strikes a current 
of atmosphere that moves away; then the 
balloon will go with the current. So, you see, 



88 EUREKA. 

the earth has no friction save the atmosphere 
alone. 

If you take a piece of paper and wrap it 
around a stick, holding the paper and stick in 
your hand, twisting the paper, holding a tight 
grip on it, the stick must turn also. For science 
to prove that the atmosphere follows up the 
earth, it must prove that the stick would turn in 
an opposite direction from that of the paper; 
this could not be done, because if you turn the 
paper that surrounds the stick holding tight the 
paper and stick, the friction being so great that 
the stick and paper would have to turn the same 
way, and in order for them to prove that the 
atmosphere follows up the earth, they must be 
able to prove that they were independent ele- 
ments, and if so, that if the atmosphere stopped, 
'the earth would go on. Some of the objections 
arising to this theory come in the shape of the 
question, What will we do about the trade- 
winds that blow from north-east to south-west, 
and what will we do with a gale that blows from 
west to east; and what will we do with the 



EUREKA. 



89 



storm in the far west, blowing from east to west ? 

We answer by summing up the whole mat- 
ter, that one gale counteracts the one blowing 
from an opposite point of the compass. 

But another objection comes in the shape, 
" that it is the nature of heated atmosphere to 
rise." If the atmosphere did rise, there would 
be a vacuum (which nature abhors), or there 
would be a constant rush of the atmosphere 
from all points to fill the vacuum, causing a 
constant roar of thunder. 

It is the nature of heated atmosphere to rise 
if the great source of heat is not above ; but, as 
it is above, and it is the nature of the heaviest 
atmosphere to stay next to its bosom friend, 
the earth, therefore its action is on the face of 
the earth, throwing off its heated air from west 
to east, and leaving but one conclusion to the 
matter : 

The heat of the sun is the cause ; 

The atmosphere is the agent, and 

The revolution, the effect. 



V. 

THE CAUSE OF THE MOON'S REVOLUTION? 

The reader will no doubt here ask, if. it is the 
atmosphere which causes the earths revolution, 
what causes the moon to revolve, when it has 
no atmosphere? I answer, that it once had 
an atmosphere from which it received its revo- 
lution, and now, when it has no atmosphere, 
there is no friction to stop its motion, and hence 
it continues on. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE EARTH'S REVOLUTION ON ITS AXIS. 

The earth rotates once on its axis in twenty- 
four hours. The reason for its taking just so 
long, is on account of the opposite currents of 
atmosphere; for an instance, a trade-wind blow- 
ing from the north-east to the south-west, is 
opposed by the trade- wind that blows from the 
north-west to the south-east. 

The apparent north and south motion of the 
sun does not result from the motion of the sun 
north and south, but from the earth's annual 
motion and the inclination of the earth's axis to 
the plane of its orbit. Its axis, scientists tell us, 
is inclined to the plane of the elliptic about 
twenty-three and one-half degrees, and, it being 
always parallel to itself, the earth turns her polar 
regions alternately in her annual revolution 
towards the sun, which makes him appear tQ 
have a motion north and south, 



92 EUREKA. 



\ : : '- '.'.'..'■ . -~ ■ ' - :•■ 
\ ■ . - ■ < .. " - : 

>•• "r-\ '- --■' ■ -■■■-■ 

. - V ■'■':''■ - 
NORTH POL&sS^fcz^ 


wWwoc'vOrti HORIZON 






mastic 


S8NAT .:,. 


^^^^^isOUTH POLE 




- - v.. - :.» 1 



But scientists fail to tell us why the earth 
stays at an incline of twenty-three and one-half 
degrees upon its axis upon the plane of its orbit, 
and this I deem best to explain ; and I give as 
a reason therefor, that it is on account of the 
speed of the revolution of the earth on its axis. 

For example : If you take a top and whirl it 
real fast, the top will stand up straight until its 
motion decreases, then it will continue to lean 
at a deeper angle as the speed slackens, until it 
finally falls down on its side. 

Again, It you take a wheel and roll it fast, 
the wheel will stand up, and roll straight until 
its m.otion begins to decrease, when it rolls in- 
cliningly until it falls. It being inclined twenty- 



EUREKA. 93 

three and one-half degrees, what caused it to be 
so inclined? Science fails to answer. But, I will 
answer, that it is on account of the day and date 
of the sun's being made. The sun was made on 
the twenty-first of March or the twenty-second of 
September, one hundred and eighteen millions 
of years after the earth was made, and the earth 
commenced revolving at that time on account of 
the heat of the sun's rays, and has never changed 
herinclination on account of her speed. When the 
sun was made, the two extreme points from the 
sun's rays became poles. The center between 
those two extreme points became the equator, 
and that was on the twenty-first of March, or the 
twenty-second of September, because the earth 
could never have changed her position on her 
axis on the account of her revolutions, and the 
sun being across the equator at that time, it 
was directly under the sun. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE REGULARITY OF THE SPEED OF THE EARTH'S 

REVOLUTION ON ITS AXIS. 

(Proven by the Bible.) 

In the eighth chapter of Genesis we find these 
words, ''While the earth remaineth, seed-time 
and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and 
winter, and day and night shall not cease." Al- 
though it has been said in the past that the Bible 
does not teach science, but by close observance 
we see it does teach astronomy.] 

The sun was placed over the center of the 
earth by God in his infinite mercy, because it 
was the only place for it. 

The earth being round, and the sun being 
round, you cannot hang one round ball over 
the side of another round ball. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE ATMOSPHERE, AND WHERE IT CAME FROM. 




The atmosphere came from the earth itself, 
and was made during all time. Science says that 
matter is indestructible. Astronomy teaches that 
the earth was once in a molten state, If the 



96 EUREKA. 

earth was in a molten state, and Philosophy 
teaches that as a body heats it expands, and as 
it cools it contracts, so, as the earth is con- 
stantly cooling, it is constantly contracting; 
therefore, it must be either losing in matter, or 
that matter is going into something else. 

Science says the atmosphere is composed of 
the same nature as the eafth, and the deeper 
you go down in the earth, the more the earth 
seems to be composed of the nature of the atmos- 
phere. So that is one reason why deep plough- 
ing is better than shallow ploughing. 

For proof of this, take a piece of paper and 
burn it, you see the smoke and ashes ; that paper 
is not destroyed, but has changed its form, so 
the earth will be constantly changing its form 
until it will have grown cold, then it will stop, 
contracting ; hence no more atmosphere will- 
come from it, as it will be dead, like the moon. 
The moon once had an atmosphere, but it has 
left it and gone into the rocks. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE AGE OF THE EARTH. 

The earth' is one hundred and seventy-seven 
million five thousand eight hundred and eighty- 
seven years old, or within six months of that is 
her exact age, either on the twenty-first of March 
or the twenty-second of September. As proof 
take the following figures : 

An eminent astronomer has said that it will 
take the light of the sun about eight minutes 
and one quarter to come to the earth. He also 
states that it would take the light of the farthest 
stars at least sixty million of years to reach to 
the earth. This proposition was submitted to 
the astronomer, Prof. W. McFarland, of the 
Ohio State University, who says it is the light 
of these farthest stars that makes the " Milky 
Way," and that it will take their light one more 
million of years to reach the earth from the time 
man was made. So if we subtract one million 



98 EUREKA. 

from sixty million of years it will leave fifty- 
nine million. Next we see that God made man 
on the sixth, and the stars and sun he made on 
the fourth day of creation — subtract four from 
six, it leaves two. So that fifty-nine million 
years is the length of two days, and if that be 
so, one day must be just one half of that, or, 
twenty-nine million and five hundred thousand, 
as the earth was four days old when the sun was 
made. Multiply twenty-nine million five hun- 
dred thousand by four, and the result is one 
hundred and eighteen million. So the earth 
was that age when the sun was made. We then 
add to that fifty-nine million years, which is the 
length of two days, and this brings us to the 
time when man was made, making one hundred 
and seventy-seven million of years as the age 
of the earth when man was made. The Bible 
gives an account of man before the birth of 
Christ four thousand and four years ; since the 
birth of Christ eighteen hundred and eighty- 
three years, which, added together, will make 
five thousand eight hundred and eighty-seven. 



EUREKA. 99 

These figures added to one hundred and seventy- 
seven million, give the grand total of one hun- 
dred and seventy-seven million five thousand 
eight hundred and eighty-seven years as the age 
of the earth. 

And to those who have any fears of the world 
coming to an end soon I will say, it cannot 
come to an end for nine hundred and ninety- 
four thousand one hundred and thirteen years 
from now. I don't say it will come then, but 
do say it cannot come before that length of time. 
I know nothing is impossible with God, but he 
has made laws which he cannot violate, and 
according to those laws, from all observation, it 
cannot come sooner. The Milky Way, or the 
white line we see will be one grand milky way 
or visible light from the eastern to the western 
horizon, they being the light of the farthest stars. 



CHAPTER X. 

sun's years and revolution. 

The sun's years are caused by his slow mo- 
tion on his axis, vibrating backward and forward. 
His revolution on his axis is caused by the 
influence of heat and cold shed abroad from 
other planets, so science teaches there can be 
no effect without a cause, therefore, we see that 
if the sun had been the first made of the plan- 
etary system, it could not have revolved, and 
therefore, we see that the nebular hypothesis of 
Laplace cannot be correct. It is the influence 
of the heat and cold upon the atmosphere of 
the planetary system that causes each planet to 
revolve. 

Prof. Mickleborough says he can put chem- 
icals together and cause them to revolve ; he 
may while he has another center of gravity, but 
could it have revolved while the center of grav- 
ity was within itself? I answer, no ! There- 



EUREKA. 101 

fore the nebular hypothesis could not be correct, 
for if the sun had been made first, the earth 
would have revolved while in a melted mass, 
and if it had so revolved, the earth would have 
been perfectly flat. 



CHAPTER XI. 

WHY THE EARTH'S DIAMETER IS LESS FROM POLE 

TO POLE THAN THROUGH ITS CENTER 

AT THE EQUATOR. 

The theory of Isaac Newton, I understand to 
be, that the revolution of the earth on its axis 
while in a melted state, caused it to be twenty- 
six miles less in diameter from pole to pole, 
than it is through its center at the equator. 

My theory is, that it was the contraction 
which makes the difference. As proof of the 
fact : We see that it is colder at the north and 
the south pole than it is at the equator, for at 
the equator it never freezes, and at the north 
and south pole it is constantly frozen. There- 
fore, as we have seen, science teaches that the 
earth was once in a melted mass, and natural 
philosophy teaches that when an object heats it 
expands, and as it cools it contracts. Physical 
geography teaches that the earth's crust is be- 



EUREKA. 103 

tween fifty and two hundred miles in thickness, 
and, as the earth's crust is thicker from pole to 
pole than it is through its center at the equator, 
it stands to reason, therefore, that it is con- 
tracted the most from pole to pole, and the 
cause therefor is not the revolution of the earth 
on its axis. 



CHAPTER XII. 

HOW MOUNTAINS WERE MADE. 

Some scientists teach that the mountains were 
made by pressure of the sea under the earth, 
others that the upheaval was caused by inter- 
nal heat; but neither hypothesis is true, for if 
it was the internal heat, we will liken it to a man 
buried in a grave alive, and that there be a par- 
tition in the grave, one half of the grave being 
filled to the top with solid slab stone, the other 
half filled with soft, downy feathers. Then, 
having free use of his muscles,and he wants to get 
out, where would he be most liable to come 
out, through the stone or through the feathers? 
Every sensible man will say, come out through 
the feathers. Then, if it was the internal heat 
which had such force as to upheave the moun- 
tains, as science teaches, why did it not come 
out through the rarer part of the earth's surface, 
rather than through the most rocky surface? 



EUREKA. 105 

If it was the pressure of the sea, and the 
water had such force as to throw up such ranges 
of solid rock, why did it not press out over the 
continent ? 

My theory is, that the mountains were made 
by contraction; for, as the rocky regions are 
denser than the rarer part of the earth's surface, 
it must necessarily press up in order to fit down 
to the earth's surface. The earth was at one 
time larger than it is now, so as it cools it is 
still contracting and growing less. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

HOW THE EARTH WILL APPEAR WHEN BURNING. 

It will look like a comet. Prof. Herschel 
said, in 1854, he saw a planet burning, and it 
was the comet. It is plain to be seen that that 
which is called the comet's tail is the light of 
the burning planet. 

And for proof of this, witness a burning 
building, or any large fire ; its light ascends up 
toward the heavens further than it does out to 
the sides, and the light of that fire is the tail. 
So that when our world is burning up, or melt- 
ing with the fervent heat the Bible speaks of, 
we will look to the people of other planets as a 
comet, and will be a comet to their vision. 
Though it is often said that the tail of the comet 
is always toward the sun, it is also true that the 
tail of the comet is often curved, and the reason 
this is so is, because its orbit is always curved. 
The orbit of the comet is nearer straight than 



EUREKA. 107 

that of any other planet, because the sun has 
lost a portion of its gravity on the comet by the 
comet becoming rarified by fire. Thus it flies 
off in space and is lost never to return. 
Yet astronomers, I am told, say that comets 
often appear a second time, but that cannot be 
true; a world could not come to an end but 
once. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

HOW TO TELL THE APPROACH OF THE EARTH TO 

THE SUN. 

The approach of the earth to the sun may be 
told by the length of our days. If we get 
nearer the sun the heat of it would necessarily 
be greater. Therefore, the motion of the at- 
mosphere would be greater. So that the revo- 
lution of the earth would be faster, and our 
days shorter. This could not be unless the 
earth would decrease in speed in its orbit, or 
the sun increase in power of its gravity. So 
that astronomers have often agitated, or caused 
the weak-minded people to live in fear that the 
earth would soon collide with the sun ; but that 
cannot be so. You need have no fear; no trouble 
of that kind is near at hand, or can take place 
without previous notice being given by the 
length of our days as spoken of above. 



CHAPTER XV. 

WHAT CAUSED THE BASIN OF THE OCEAN. 

The basin of the ocean was caused by con- 
traction of the earth as it cools. The basin is 
of rarer material than any part of the earth's 
surface; it must necessarily contract more. The 
clay ground is higher than the black earth, or 
soil. The sand hill is higher than the clay. 
The gravel is higher than the sand bank. The 
stone quarries are higher than the gravel bank, 
and the mountains are higher than all the rest. 
This gradation exists because of their density 
and thickness. 

The black ground being more porous, says 
the scientist, than the clay land, it must neces- 
sarily have contracted more while in a melted 
mass. Therefore, if a line should be drawn and 
the estimate made, on an average, the contrac- 
tion of the black soil more than the clay would 



110 EUREKA. 

be about one-third greater; clay about one-half 
greater than the sand ; sand one-eighth greater 
than gravel ; gravel will contract one-half more 
than stone quarries, and stone quarries one- 
tenth more than mountains. These are about 
the proportions, owing to the thickness or den- 
sity of the bed. This may not be true in all 
cases, but generally I have found it so by actual 
measurement and weight. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

WHY WE HAVE WATER AT THE NORTH AND SOUTH 
POLES. 

On account of nature we have water at the 
poles. If it wasn't for the nature of warm water 
to seek a cooler climate, and the cold water to 
run towards the equator, or where the earth is 
going the fastest, we would have no water at the 
poles ; so it is the nature of water, or liquid, to 
seek the level. The warm water is made to run 
toward the poles by the vacancy of the cold 
water running towards the equator. Thus it is 
we have water at the poles, otherwise the water 
would be all around the equator and no water at 
the poles. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

THE EARTH IS ROUND AND MY REASONS FOR IT. 
THOSE GIVEN BY ISAAC NEWTON NOT CONCLUSIVE. 

I agree with scientists that the earth is round 
for the reason that a brick house is larger at the 
top than at its bottom, when it is built exactly 
plumb by a plumb bob. No house is the same 
size top and bottom, except it be a frame house 
that is framed square upon the ground before it 
is raised. For proof : You see a buggy wheel 
is round, and as the spokes extend out from the 
hub toward the tire, they become wider apart 
according to the distance ; so with a brick house. 
A lower corner being nearer the center of 
gravity, and a top corner being farther away 
from it, and being exactly plumb, there being 
but one center of gravity, and the earth being 
nearly round, it must necessarily follow that the 
top corners will be wider apart. Skilful brick- 
masons, in building a tall edifice, will verify this 
proposition. 

Science gives eight reasons to prove the earth 



EUREKA. 113 

round. I give three new and additional ones : 
Sir Isaac Newton gives as the greatest proof 
that the earth is round, that, when a ship is 
coming into and going from port, you see the 
sail first and last. But that reason seems very- 
frivolous to me, for if the earth was flat the 
same thing would appear— you would see the 
sail first and last ; for it is said that at the level 
of the sea the pressure of the atmosphere is 
about fifteen pounds to the square inch. Now 
you can look up higher on a prairie, than you 
can look horizontally over the land, for it is 
evident that the atmosphere being denser at the 
earth's surface than higher up, you can see 
more distinct looking perpendicular than on 
a horizontal plane. As an evidence of this, in 
looking over the ground in summer time, we see 
an action of the heat in the atmosphere which 
we do not see bylooking up ; therefore, in look- 
ing at an angle of twenty degrees, you may see 
the masts of a ship, but you cannot see the hull 
of it, because of the density of the atmosphere. 
Again, we can look off and see what is called a 



114 EUREKA. 

visible horizon ; a person may go beyond that 
point and see the sky rocket, and yet could not 
see the man who fires it off. So I consider this 
will, if not destroy, at least damage to a great 
extent, the evidence of Sir Isaac Newton of the 
rotundity of the earth, which has been acted on 
so generally as proof positive. Yet you must 
not think for a moment that I deny that the 
earth is round, for I claim that it is, and 'my 
evidence proves it. My second reason why it is 
round is, that it would be an impossibility for it 
to be otherwise, because, 

ist. Center of gravity would have made it 
rou'nd without any other factor. 

2nd. If the earth was flat, and the United 
States was on one side, at sunrise, in Portland, 
Maine, it would also be sunrise at San Francisco. 
Then, when it was sunset in San Francisco, it 
would also be sunset in Portland ; but this is 
not the case, for we see that the difference in 
time in Portland and San Francisco is between 
three and four hours. 

3rd. Some people will have it that the eartli 



EUREKA. 115 

is hollow, or in the form of a saucer. If this 
was the case, when it was sunrise in Portland it 
would be sunrise in San Francisco, and it would 
not be sunrise at Omaha City, Nebraska. And 
I will pass from this absurd hypothesis and give 
my Third reason why the earth is round ; namely, 
because the mountains are up. If the earth was 
flat, the mountains would be just as liable to be 
down as up, but as the curvature of the earth 
is up, hence the mountains are up ; for if you 
take a sheet of paper and hold it perfectly level 
and press on each edge it will press up or down. 
The tendency of it is not up, but on a down 
curve ; it would be just as liable to go down as 
up. So I consider this one amongst the greatest 
proofs that the earth is round, for the paper not 
being on a level, but curved up as the earth is, 
and you press on it, it must necessarily curve 
up. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

VOLCANOES. 

A volcano is to the earth what a safety-valve 
is to a steam boiler ; if it was not the safety- 
valves allowing the steam to escape, when its 
body became larger than the number of pounds 
allowed to a particular boiler, it would be liable 
to explode ; so if it was not for the volcanoes 
the earth would be liable to burst open here 
and swallow us up as it does elsewhere ; but 
God doeth all things well, so that we may lie 
down and sleep in peace, feeling assured that we 
will waken in the morning knowing the earth is 
here the same as it was when we went to bed. 

Volcanoes are made by the pouring out of the 
melted lava and cooling layer upon layer until 
it has become a considerable height ; hence 
every eruption which throws out lava will make 
the volcano the higher. There are three kinds 
of volcanoes: 1st, the trembling; 2nd, the up- 



EUREKA. 117 

heaving; and, 3rd, the inundated. The follow- 
ing figures represent the throats of the three 
general kinds. 




Trembling. Upheaving and inundating. 

For proof that the different kinds of throat 
here exist, take if you please, a wagon running 
over a rough road ; it will have to go up and 
down to suit the road. If a volcano has hard 
stone and rock in the side of the crater, and the 
crater threw off large rocks weighing many hun- 
dreds of tons, against the rough and ragged 
sides of the crater, causing the great shakings 
of the volcano to and fro, and the volcano being 
completely fastened to mother earth, she must 
give to suit the eruptions of the volcano. 
Science says the crater of a volcano is of a cone 



118 EUREKA. 

shape at the top, but it is silent as to all save 
the top. It is a self-evident fact, that a wagon 
or vehicle going over a rough road must have 
two motions; one, the propelling, the other, 
the plane of the road over which the passage is 
made. 

The upheaving volcano is of a cone shape 
at the top, having a solid stone over the top of 
the crater, though the interior of the crater may 
be rough and ragged. So that when the internal 
heat is at an immense pressure upon the top of 
the stone, no eruption takes place exterior, but 
interior there does. And as proof of this fact, 
there is an organ having two stops, one with the 
word "No," and one with the word "Yes," 
written on it, and if you push one of the stops 
in, the other one will come out. So you see that 
if the earth is too full of gas or steam, the pres- 
sure is so great that it must have room. There- 
fore, in order to get room, the bed of the sea is 
forced up, because the earth is easiest forced 
up there. That is why on the continent 
the volcanic internal commotions throw up 



EUREKA. 119 

the bed of the sea and thus form the islands. 
The bed of the sea being weaker than the crust 
of the earth, it finds relief there instead of through 
the crater, though the islands may be centuries 
in forming and forcing up. Islands may be 
formed off of the top of volcanoes in the ocean. 
Islands are made in the water because there 
can be no islands without water. 

The shapes of the crater of the inundating 
volcanoes are the same as those of the upheav- 
ing ones. When the volcano has gained force 
enough oni the inside of the earth, by the gases, 
then, the stone becoming weakened by the in- 
ternal heat and thereby melted away, then, the 
force of the interior is sufficient to throw the 
cap-stone off, when it becomes an external erup- 
tion, and the island that was made by the up- 
heaval of the internal heat, sinks back to its 
former position, when it becomes an inundating 
volcano, and if too much of the internal heat, 
or lava of the volcano is thrown out, then the 
bed of the ocean sinks farther down than its 
original position. 



120 EUREKA. 

There is a difference in the quake of the earth 
made by volcanic eruptions and that of firing a 
cannon, or the motion of a heavy train of cars. 
With the first, it is sideways, to and fro, while 
with the second, it is up and down; because 
one is in the crust of the earth, while the other 
is on top of the earth. 

It may be added here, if sound travels by 
vibration, as science teaches, and science teach- 
es that vibration creates heat, that if a cricket 
should stand on one end of a solid slab-stone 
and rub his wings together, why is it that the 
vibration with the particles of stone does not com- 
pletely melt the stone in ten minutes? I deny 
the hypothesis. 

Volcanoes are in the rocky and mountainous 
regions, because there is no need of them in the 
rarer portions of the earth's surface, as the heat 
of the atmosphere can get through the rarer 
parts of the earth's surface without any special 
effort. Now it is evident, as the earth is filled 
in the mountainous regions with stone, iron, and 



EUREKA. 121 

other hard substances, the atmosphere- and in- 
ternal heat combined, gather in stated places, 
and escapes with great force by reason of such 
obstructions, thus causing the eruptions. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

THE TWO TORRID ZONES OF THE THIRD AGE. 

There were two warm climates, or torrid zones 
far apart, where the animal and vegetable king- 
dom first appeared, or the third age had its ex- 
istence. They were located around the north 
and the south poles, and were formed by the 
internal and external heat as the crust of the 
earth was yet thin, though thick enough for the 
third age, to have its existence. 

That region of country between the north 
and south poles, or the temperate and torrid 
zones, were yet too warm for the third age, (or 
the age of vegetation,) to have its existence, 
and as the crust of the earth cooled down, the 
third age extended toward the equator from 
both the north and south. 

It has been taught by scientists, that the 
earth's poles used to be from equator to equa- 
tor; that the equator used to be where the poles 
are now, and that it is undergoing a change now 
and will soon be back to what they assert was 



EUREKA. 123 

its former position. That the poles were once 
warm by the changing of the earth's inclination, 
and this they attempt to prove by the mammoth 
bones which are found in abundance in the frig- 
id zones, and that they are now also found in 
the torrid zones, and it seems evident if they 
are found in the torrid zones now that their 
natures must have been adapted to a warm cli- 
mate, which I do not deny. And still, the 
works of the coral insect are found off the coast 
of Greenland and Iceland, and to-day they are 
found at work off the coast of New Zealand, 
and coral reefs are found in the Indian Ocean. 
Hence, the coral insect can not have its existence 
where the temperature is below sixty-eight de- 
grees Fahrenheit; therefore, it seems evident that 
it must have been warm there, which I do not 
deny. I have also given another proof in the 
former part of this treatise, but I do deny that 
their heat was received as claimed by scientists; 
because, as heretofore stated, the earth never 
could have changed her position, on account of 
her revolutions on her axis. 



CHAPTER XX. 

THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW EARTH. 

The Bible says: "But the day of the Lord 
will come as a thief in the night; in which 
the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, 
and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. 
The earth also, and the works that are therein, 
shall be burned up." 

"Seeing, then, that all these things shall be 
dissolved, what manner of persons ought we to 
be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking 
for, and hastening unto the coming of the day 
of God, wherein the heavens, being on fire, shall 
be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with 
fervent heat. Nevertheless, we, according to 
his promise, look for new heavens and a new 
earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. " 

This new heaven and new earth will be here, 
and will be brought into form as such, by fire. 
God will not consume this earth, but He will 



EUREKA. 125 

melt it with fervent heat, that the works of in- 
iquity may be burned up, and this world will 
then be a pure earth, undefiled and uncorrupt. 
Science teaches, that when men melt gold or 
silver, they get out a certain amount of dross, 
and they say the gold is fourteen, sixteen or 
eighteen karats fine. If they take out all the 
dross, they call it pure gold ; and if God burns 
up all the works of iniquity, this will then be a 
pure earth, one grand garden of our God, from 
pole to pole, from meridian to meridian, our 
new heaven and our new earth, 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THE CENTER OF GRAVITY. 

Some scientists teach now that the surface of 
the earth is the center of gravity. But this is 
not so. There is certainly a center of gravity as 
taught by Sir Isaac Newton, and it cannot be 
successfully denied by any one. Scientists say" 
there is a mountain, where if you drop a stone 
from its summit, it will light behind the base of 
the mountain. The stone lights behind, because 
of its being retarded in its descent by the at- 
mosphere through which it falls, by the friction, 
as the earth is revolving at the same speed, 
and when you let go the stone it lights behind. 
Yet it falls toward the center of the earth, just 
as when you are plumbing the corner of a house 
and you hold the string of the plumb bob it 
points toward the center of the earth. 

Some scientists teach that there is no gravity 
in the earth, but that the atmosphere is the 



EUREKA. 127 

pressure. J. Wilford Hall, of New York, is 
one who teaches such hypothesis. Supposing 
the atmosphere was the pressure it is, and there 
was no center of gravity, as he says, then why 
is it when you throw a stone in the water it does 
not swim instead of sink. The stone continues 
on toward the center of gravity till it strikes the 
bottom, and such hypothesis must be false. 
Again, if this be true, a sheet of paper might 
be laid upon the ground, while a sharp-pointed 
iron spike of great weight might be stuck up 
into the atmosphere, because, according to this 
hypothesis, the paper should weigh more than 
the heavy iron spike, as the surface of inches is 
greater. Thus to say that there is no center of 
gravity is utterly without foundation. 

Again, a body will weigh more at mid-night 
than at mid-day, for the reason, when the body 
is between the earth and the sun, the sun has a 
tendency to attract that body towards it at mid- 
day, and at mid-night the earth and the sun are 
at an angle from the body. Hence they both 
perform their attractive powers one way. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

METEORS AND THEIR CAUSES. 

The question of meteors has long agitated the 
minds of scientists much. 

They come from other planets — being stones 
thrown out of volcanoes in other planets at so 
great a distance as to lose their attraction toward 
that planet, and they roam about until they 
have reached the attraction of another planet, 
which comes along, and then descend to it. I 
do not deny that the earth may be throwing off 
rocks and sending them as meteors to other 
planets. We know that they have the nature 
of rocks, as they are composed of oxygen. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

THE SO-CALLED GLACIER PERIOD. 

I say " so-called, " because I don't believe it 
is correct. The hollows and ravines were 
caused by the abating of the flood. If the earth 
had revolved while in a melted mass, the glacier 
period could have never existed, for we all agree 
that it was in a melted mass, and if so, the heat 
would have prevented the earth from freezing 
over, but of course the earth was covered with 
water, as the basin of the ocean had not become 
deep enough to draw the water from the face of 
the earth to it. Again, we do not find the prai- 
ries and the level land ploughed with ravines 
and cuts, as scientists say were caused by the 
glaciers. We always find hollows and deep 
cuts in the higher lands. The reason for it is 
good, because there the water would have a 
tendency to run more rapidly, wearing and cut- 
ting as it went. It is evident that there have 



130 EUREKA. 

been many more floods than Noah's, and before 
it, and it is certain that mountains and hills ex- 
isted before it, for in the account of the flood in 
the Bible, it is said that the Ark rested "upon 
the mountains of Ararat." These mountains 
must have been so named prior to the flood. 
Again, "on the first day of the month were the 
tops of the mountains seen." 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE EGYPTIAN PYRAMIDS. 

The Egyptian Pyramids were made by the 
wearing of the wind and water. They will wear 
away in time the most solid rock. 

The Appalachian Mountains are the oldest and 
first in the United States. Scientists say, they 
seem to be folded, or rounded at the top. It is 
evidently true that they are so shaped ; if so, 
they have been so made by the wind and water. 
The mountains that were made after the water 
had receded are sharper and more ragged. In 
Kent's Cave, between England and Scotland, is 
found a hole where the perpetual dropping of 
water has worn seven inches in depth in a solid 
rock. The Egyptian Pyramids are made in this 
wise, as are small stone quarries, that cover per- 
haps half an acre. As the land contracted, those 
quarries could not at that time contract as the 
land surrounding them did. In the valley of 



132 EUREKA. 

the Nile they are made up principally of sand 
and gravel; the land contracted, leaving the sand, 
and the quarry was worn to a point by the 
action of the wind and water. These small 
quarries, which dot the earth here and there, 
will some day, if not disturbed, and the earth 
has its existence long enough, be as the Egyp- 
tian Pyramids now are. 



CONCLUSION. 

Dear Reader : — The time has come for us 
to part. I first endeavored to give you an idea 
of things terrestrial and celestial, and now I have 
concluded the giving of the author's theories as 
to the Creator's rules, by which our world is 
governed. While our journey has been through 
varied scenes, and we have, perhaps, at times been 
wearied because we found it hard to understand 
the lessons taught, yet I hope the hour spent in 
' "Eureka" has not been in vain, but has pre 
sented the world to you, stripped of its insipid 
character, and lack of power to please, that you 
need no longer in your unoccupied moments 
seek for some way to kill time, but that your 
future journeyings through life, may be along 
clearer streams and brighter paths, by reason 
of the glimpses here given through "The 
Golden Door Ajar." 

We speak of the volume of nature, and truly 
a volume it is, whose author and writer is God. 
To read it, dost thou, dost man so much as well 
know the alphabet thereof, much less its words, 



134 EUREKA. 

sentences, and grand descriptive pages, poetical 
and philosophical, spread out through solar sys- 
tems, and thousands of years ? It is a volume 
written in celestial hieroglyphs, in the sacred 
mysteries of which even prophets are happy, that 
they can read here a line and there a line. This 
fair universe, e'en in the meanest province 
thereof, is in very deed the star-domed city of 
God. Through every star, through every grass 
blade, through every living soul, the glory of a 
present God still beams. 

Have we not acquired the knowledge that 
nothing in the universe comes by chance ? 
Where appears so plainly the footprints and 
handiwork of the Creator, but that all creation 
moves on under, and is governed by fixed 
laws, in which there is no variableness nor 
shadow of turning, and is guided by the same 
loving hand, which rules the storm in its fury, 
and "tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," 
which makes the volcano to belch forth its 
streams of fiery lava, and causes the tender 
blade of grass to peep silently above the sur- 
face of the earth ? That same hand is presented 
to us that we may grasp, and be led in "ways 
of pleasantness," and "in paths of peace." 



EtJREKA. 135 

Our pilgrimage has been attended with lessons 
of instruction — where we could read, leaf by 
leaf, the strata of the earth in the open book of 
nature. 

We started in the first age, seeing no living 
thing, to kill the monotony of our wanderings 
through sea-weed and fern, as we gazed upon 
the material out of which this world was to 
commence life, until we reached the confines of 
the second age, where we found naught but the 
slimy life of shells, crinoids and trilobites, which 
for centuries lived as monarch's of the universe. 
As we kept on in our dreary stroll, the historic 
pages told us through the appearance of fishes 
in the sea, and vegetation on the land that we 
had reached the third age. Here we found new 
interest, for it was an advance toward our 
higher civilization. We pressed on for ages 
through marshy lands, and dense forests of 
trees and shrubs, where the crocodile, frogs, 
and such animals as live in both land and 
water, crossed our path ; in this condition the 
fourth age closed down around us, and we 
entered upon the ground of the fifth age, near 
the close of which we met four-legged animals, 
which suckled their young. Then light began 



136 EUREKA* 

to break upon our vision, as we neared the edge 
of the wilderness, and the sweet scent of flowers 
and the singing of birds were wafted by gentle 
zephyrs from the Garden of Eden, where, after 
our ages of wandering, we, for the first time, 
found man, who was made a little lower than 
the angels, and invested with a monarch's 
power, over the fish of the sea, and over the 
fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all 
the earth, and over every creeping thing that 
creepeth upon the earth. His surroundings 
were so varied, as to make his life a happy one. 
But in his prosperity he forgot God, listened to 
Satan and sinned. With sin came its penalty, 
death, into the world. Then, man's dreary 
pilgrimage began from the cradle to the grave. 
As to how dreary it must be, rests with man 
himself. 

If he refuses to see anything in life but bleak- 
ness, if he fails to see the beauties of nature, 
or hear the voice of his Creator cheering him on, 
if he starve his better self, and spend his life in 
accumulating money, and gratifying his lust, then 
indeed, is life to him a bitter inheritance, and he, 
of all men, most miserable. 

The lessons of nature, if studied and applied 



EUREKA. 137 

aright, will become a panacea for the ills of life, 
will lighten the burden, and relieve the 
wearied traveller. In the study of nature, 
man touches his Maker and Savior on every 
side. Is not this thought, together with the 
thought that He travelled over the same road 
man now travels, and battled with the same 
temptations which now beset man's path, 
enough to dispel every cloud of adversity which 
may appear in his horizon ? If you look upon 
the hills and mountains as merely clay, stone, 
and trees, the rocks as only fit to build houses, 
macadamize roads, and pave side walks, the 
green grass as only food for cattle, and the rose 
as something which is to exists for an hour, 
then to drop and die, with no voice of their 
author speaking to you, then will your life be 
but half a life ; for they were not made just be- 
cause the Creator could make them, but as a 
thousand tongues speaking His praises. Sur- 
rounded by such attendants, man should not be 
sad when adverse winds blow upon him, but 
should be enabled to take up the refrain of the 
Psalmist : ' 'Why art thou cast down, O my soul ? 
f^ncl why art thou disquieted in me ? Hope thou in 



138 EUREKA. 

God ; for I shall yet praise Him for the help of 
His countenance." 

Did you ever walk beside the tiny rivulet, 
while it rushed laughingly on, flecked with foam, 
as its course was suddenly impeded by a little 
nest of stones in its bed, and watch it dance and 
sparkle in the sun, as it let go a rocky riffle here to 
jump into a miniature lake further on, and while 
watching, another rivulet comes merrily dancing 
to join it from another course, and they in turn, as 
they moved along, were joined by others, until 
the stream widened and deepened into rivers, 
and passed on to the ocean ? Or, did you ever 
stand upon the ocean's beach, or river's shore, 
and listen to its mysterious, half-human sighs and 
moans, as the albatross or the gull, slowly and sol- 
emnly moved its out-stretched wings, as if invok- 
ing the benedictions of heaven, and watch the 
waves as they chased each other along only to die 
in the race, and fade away in the foam of its suc- 
cessor, while the great vessel ladened with its cargo 
of precious souls, starts out upon its course as a 
monument of faith, that the God of the land is 
the God of the waters, who would bring them 
in safety through the breakers to their destined 
harbor? Did you ever witness these and fail to 



EUREKA. 139 

cast at least one thought to the great ruler of 
the world ? 

Did you ever stand in a wooded solitude, or 
on the lonely mountain top, at break of day and 
listen to the whisperings of nature, as the first 
rays of day-life streaked the dawn in the east, 
when the living earth, like some great beast, 
seemed to rise, shake herself, and bathe her face 
in the dew as it fell, drop by drop, from leaf to 
leaf, and hear the insect life lending its minor 
strains to the bird choir, who, with a thousand 
melodious voices, sounding like harps in the air, 
chanted their morning hymn of praise to the au- 
thor of their being, and not feel the mellowing 
influences of a nearness to the great architect of 
all architects ? Can we doubt that our research 
in the volume of nature has been fruitful in re- 
vealing the mysteries of that better inner life, 
which lies, too often, dormant within the exist- 
ence of all living ? As we look upon the bush, 
which is black and apparently dead in winter, 
burst the old life's shell in the rays of the warm 
sun of spring, and smile into new life, opening 
its shell-tinted lips, and speaking to us of im- 
mortality and of the resurrection, we feel that 



140 EUREKA. 

" There is no death ! The dust we tread 
Shall change beneath the summer showers 

To golden grain, or mellowed fruit, 
Or rainbow-tinted flowers. 

The granite rocks disorganize, 

And feed the hungry moss they bear; 

The forest leaves drink daily life, 
From out the viewless air. 

There is no death! The leaves may fall, 
And flowers may fade and pass away ; 

They only wait through wintry hours, 
The coming of the May. 

There is no death ! 
God, God alone, is Life ; and all our life. 
And all the varying substance of the world, 
From him derived, and vitalized by him ; 
And every change which we ascribe to death 
Is but a change in form, or place, or state, 
Of something which can never cease to live." 

And while we have journeyed by the deep, 
pure waters of God's love, listening to the still 
small voice, and gazing upon the fierce convul- 
sions of the earth's internal emotions, and view- 
ing the relics of the revolutions in nature, which 
mark the decade of the earth's years^ have npt 



EUREKA. 141 

our minds been overwhelmed with their magni- 
tude, and a longing seized us for a knowledge 
of why such things should be ? 

Let us hope in this hour that we have been 
girded with strength, and the better prepared 
for an advancement in the higher life. If in 
looking through a glass darkly here, it is so 
beautiful and inspiring, what must be the effect 
in that purer, better, and higher life, where we 
will be enabled, in the shadow of the Creator's 
throne, to know and see all in the dazzling 
light of heaven ? 



THE END. 



LETTERS OF COMMENDATION 

— OF THE— 

AUTHOR AND HIS THEORIES. 

Oberlin, Ohio, October 8, 1881. 
To whom it may concern : — The bearer of this letter, 
Prof. Asa T. Green, is a lecturer of wonderful ability. 
He has lectured on science before our students and in 
the presence of our leading business men, newspaper 
editors and superintendent of public schools. He com- 
pletely overthrows all scientific theories advanced by 
other scientists. His arguments are unanswerable. He 
has the appearance of a drunken man and a tramp, 
but while listening to him you forget everything else, 
and sit entranced with his eloquence as long as he 
chooses to command your attention. 

Respectfully yours. 

J. A. SHERIDAN, 
Office of the Oberlin Telegraph Co. 

To whom it may concern : — For four hours my school 
listened with great profit to the lecture of Mr. Green. 
Money could not dispossess me of the notes I gathered 
were it not to be replaced. While Newton lives fresh in 
my mind so must this poor-looking, God-gifted prodigy. 
JOHN MASON DUNCAN, 

Principal Mifflin Academy. 
Pennsylvania, Nov. 14, 1882. 

Sunbury High School, Pa., March 3rd, 1880. 
To whom it may concern : — This morning Asa T. 
Green, of Troy, O., by courtesy of Sunbury School 
Board lectured to the pupils of the school. Subject, 
Physical Geography, and Natural Science. His theory 
is original, logical and, we think, true ; though against 



Isaac Newton's views. He spoke over an hour during 
the school period — a privilege not formerly granted to 
any one. He deserves attention and patronage, notwith- 
standing his appearance, for the sake of truth he teaches 
not found in the book. 

W. J. WOLVERTON, Assistant Principal. 
I. C. Irwin, W. S. Rhoads, Geo. D. Bucher, Directors. 
Office of Principal of Third Dist. School, Dayton, 

To educated people : — Prof. Asa T. Green has visited 
my schools this afternoon and is now more interesting 
than ever before. His arguments are unanswerable by 
those who hear him, and those who have never had an 
opportunity should be willing to go many miles to hear 
this great astronomer and scientist in his own new theo- 
ries. A. B. SHANCK. 

Irwin Station, Pa., February 17, 1880. 

Mr. Asa Green has been in our schools and gave to 
our teachers and advanced scholars his lectures on sci- 
ence. His ideas are orginal and instructive. His ap- 
pearance is against him, but when you get acquainted 
with him you will find him to be a second Isaac New- 
ton. J. CHAMBERLAIN, Superintendent. 

I regard Mr. Green as one of nature's miracles. Give 
him a patient hearing. E. B. SWEENEY. 

Cincinnati Wesleyan College Jan. 31, 1883. 
To the public : — We take pleasure in adding our testi- 
mony to the very original and very interesting lessons 
given by Asa T. Green. His methods in physical geo- 
graphy and astronomy are unique. Notwithstanding 
his peculiarities he held the young ladies' attention in a 
surprising manner. He is a marvel of human nature. 
W, K. BROWN, Pres. 
M. McCLELLEN BROWN 
J. G. OBERMEYER. 
Coshocton Public Schools. 
To whom it may concern : — At first sight I thought 
the bearer, Asa Green, was drunk. I found out that he 
is a genius, a remarkable man, who has gathered a rich 
treasure of knowledge in the woods. He delivered a 



good lecture to our high school. Therefore, "Judge 
not according to the appearance, but out of his mouth, for 
there is truth in him." EDWARD E. HENRY. 

Warsaw, Ind. 
To whom it may concern : — This is to certify that Prof. 
Asa T. Green has demonstrations and theories that I 
never saw, heard or read of before, and believe they 
have no equals in the universe. Yours, very truly, 

C. A. STURGIS, Supt. 
Crawfordsville, Ind., | 
Office of Sup't of Public Schools. J 
He is a most wonderful person, entirely uneducated, 
and yet possessed of a fund of scientific knowledge per- 
fectly surprising. W. H. FRY. 

Steubenville, O. 
He is full of ideas as an egg is of meat, although many 
of his ideas are his own property. Some have called 
him a second Isaac Newton. Yours respectfully, 

H. N. METZ. 
Sup't's Office of Public Schools, j 
Perrysburg, O. J 
Prof. Asa T. Green is a genius of the highest order. 
He is unique as well as original. Give him a hearing. 
Don't allow his peculiarities to deceive you. 
Yours for the cause of knowledge, G. B. BOONE. 

Dayton, O. 
I regard the bearer, Asa T. Green, as great a wonder 
in his specialty — astronomy — as Blind Tom is a musical 
wonder. While uneducated, he yet advances new and 
plausible ideas upon this deepest of all sciences. He is 
both a physical and mental curiosity. 

I. JACQUE. 
Ohio Wesleyan University, j 
Delaware, O. j 
Mr. Green is a curiosity, is a mystery. I know not 
what to make of him. He has no education whatever, 
but talks learnedly about scientific matters. 

C. H. PAYNE, 
President of University. 



CONTENTS. 



Frontispiece. 

Preface. 

Author's History of Himself. 

Introduction by the Editor. 

Geology — Its Teachings. 

Astronomy — Its Teachings. 

The Moon. 

Comets. 

Our World — When made and where it came from — 
By the Author. 

What Gave the Earth Light Before the Sun was 
Made. 

How the Earth's Motion in its Orbit was Obtained. 

How the Earth's Revolution on its Axis was Ob- 
tained. 

The Cause of the Moon's Revolution. 

Earth's Revolution on its Axis. 

The Regularity of the Speed of the Earth's Revo- 
lution on its Axis in Accordance with the Bible. 

Where the Earth's Atmosphere Came From. 

The Age of the Earth. 

The Sun's Years and Movements. 

Why the Earth's Diameter is Less from Pole to 
Pole than through its Center at the Equator. 

How the Mountains are Made. 

How the Earth will Appear when Burning. 

How we may know of the Earth's Approach to the 
Sun. 

What Caused the Ocean's Basin. 

Why we have Water at the North and South Pole. 

Proofs that the Earth is Round — Those given by 
Sir Isaac Newton not Conclusive. 

Kinds of Volcanoes. 

Two Torrid Zones of the Third Age. 

The New Heaven and the New Earth. 

The Center of Gravity. 

Meteors and their Causes. 

The So-called Glacier Period. 

The Egyptian Pyramids. 

Conclusion by the Editor. 

Letters of Commendation. 



